Word: insection
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...agent of disaster is a 3-mm (one-tenth-in.) insect known to scientists as the poinsettia strain of the sweet-potato whitefly but to farmers as the Superbug. Millions of these voracious insects have spread over the Imperial Valley, massing on the undersides of leaves and sucking plants dry, weakening or killing them in the process. Farmers first noticed the flies getting worse in July, and by September swarms of them looked like white clouds. They covered windshields and got stuck between people's teeth. Farm workers had trouble inhaling and eventually had to wear masks. Not since...
...Superbug's taste, and the infestation there was never as serious. But when the fly arrived in Southern California, probably in a fruit basket or vegetable shipment, it felt right at home in the dry weather and summer temperatures that can reach 46 degreesC (115 degreesF). Because the insect is happy eating some 500 varieties of plants (one of the only vegetables it doesn't seem to like is asparagus), it found the fertile Imperial Valley to be a veritable smorgasbord...
Liem, who is also Henry Bryant Bigelow Professor of Icthyology, sought to use his expertise in marine life to solve Dunster's insect infestation. His personal request: "I wish I had ant-eating fish...
Operation DEAD, Dunster House's full-scale blitz against its insect invasion, is under way this week, and students say they are happy to be solving a problem that has been bugging them for years...
Secondly, Bazzaz has shown in experiments that butterfly larvae that eat leaves with a higher carbon-to-nitrogen ratio than normal are more prone to death. They have a higher mortality rate and grow less than larvae that eat leaves grown from a nitrogen-rich environment. Consequently, insect populations will go down, which in turn may upset the food chain...