Open AccessAn arid house for a xerophilic bug Nysius huttoni
Author(s) -
T. E. Sullivan
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
proceedings of the new zealand weed and pest control conference/new zealand plant protection/proceedings of the ... national weeds conference/proceedings of the new zealand weed control conference/proceedings of the new zealand plant protection conference
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 0370-2804
pISSN - 0370-0968
DOI - 10.30843/nzpp.2016.69.5926
Subject(s) - humidity , arid , relative humidity , biology , insect , toxicology , ecology , meteorology , geography
With sensors and microprocessors becoming more affordable all the time it is now possible to build inexpensive environmental regulators for small insect colony boxes We designed and built a humidity regulator for xerophilic (dryloving) Nysius bugs Poorly ventilated insect rearing boxes can have an overly elevated humidity that can promote unwanted fungal growth especially if there is live plant material involved Air conditioned laboratories can have very low ambient humidity but the ideal humidity for an insect colony may be intermediate Direct and accurate measurement and control of humidity is now possible electronically using sensors and a fan to pump dry air into a humid space in a controlled fashion to regulate the humidity The potential exits for different sensors to be used to monitor different environmental variables and to trigger equipment to respond when an environmental threshold is reached Environmental control methods can be simple or elaborate depending on the colony requirements and budget A clock and memory card can be added to the microprocessor to record sensor data and event triggers This method has been successfully used to rear the wheat bug Nysius huttoni