Evaluating pesticide mixtures for resistance management in asexual insect pests
Many economically important insect pests reproduce through asexual or partially asexual life cycles, yet how reproductive mode influences insecticide resistance management remains unclear. The choice of resistance management strategy has been suggested to differ for sexual and asexual pests. For instance, current IRAC guidance suggests that pesticide mixtures are less effective in non-mating…
Evaluating pesticide mixtures for resistance management in asexual insect pests is a crucial topic in understanding how reproductive mode influences insecticide resistance management. The IRAC guidance suggests that pesticide mixtures might be less effective in non-mating pests compared to sexually reproducing populations. To explore this, stochastic evolutionary simulations were employed to compare resistance evolution under sequences and mixtures across four reproductive modes commonly found in economically important pests: sexual reproduction, obligate parthenogenesis, cyclical parthenogenesis, and haplodiploidy.
Contrary to expectations, the study found that mixtures do not perform worse in asexual populations. In fact, in some cases, mixtures might even lead to delayed resistance evolution compared to sexually reproducing populations. This intriguing phenomenon can be attributed to the reduced genetic recombination in asexual populations, which hampers the assembly and spread of multi-resistant genotypes.
Therefore, these findings suggest that pesticide mixtures remain a viable resistance management strategy for pests with asexual reproduction.
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