"Spain: "We need to define a working protocol to optimise biological control in cucumbers"

Hortyfruta and Cajamar Caja Rural held the 2nd Agronomic Technical Seminar "Integrated Pest Management in Cucumbers", whose main objective is to promote biological control and integrated pest management in cucumber cultivation. COEXPHAL manager, Juan Colomina, along with the president of HORTYFRUTA, Francisco Góngora, and the Agro-food and Cooperative Business Director of BCC, Roberto Garcia, opened this important seminar.

According to Juan Carlos Gázquez, coordinator of Innovation and Transfer of the Experimental Station Cajamar Las Palmerillas, "there are many crops where biological control has been generally implemented, such as peppers, virtually at 100%, and tomatoes, with around 80% currently produced under this technique. In the case of cucumbers, a more complex crop, there are some technical difficulties, the implementation of natural enemies is more complicated and the results have not been as successful as with other products."

Biological control has actually been implemented in most of Almeria's greenhouses, although there are still some with ample room for improvement. Cucumbers entail some of the worst difficulties when dealing with biological control. At present, and according to the Provincial Delegation of Agriculture and Fisheries, Almeria has 4,839 hectares of cucumbers, of which 2,570 hectares are grown with biological control techniques, i.e. more than 50%, so there is still a long way to go.

As noted by Gázquez, "there is no single measure allowing for a good implementation of biological control in cucumbers because it is a more complex crop that requires a protocol that combines techniques such as mass trapping using chromotropic traps, the release of natural enemies and treatments with insecticides and fungicides that are not harmful to these natural enemies, i.e. a whole protocol for integrated pest management."

It was stated that the key to the success in the integrated control of cucumbers is the implementation of a unified protocol based on four pillars, as described by Francisco Sola, technician at Nature Choice SAT: preventing the entry of pests into the greenhouse, using chromotropic traps to capture as many insects as possible, releasing the Swirskii at the right time and being careful with previous pesticide treatments. When dealing with predatory mite, the products used should always be compatible with the Swirskii.

Experts on the crop are optimistic and believe that this technical workshop can help in defining an integrated control protocol that will allow for an increase in the cucumber acreage protected with biological control, although, as stated by the coordinator of Innovation and Transfer of the Experimental Station Cajamar Las Palmerillas, the cucumber planting this season will already be largely complete, and in many cases, the release of natural enemies will have already been carried out. "We hope that it will increase for later cucumber varieties, as well as next spring."