The use of Murraya koenigii as a trap crop for the management of the psyllid Diaphorina citri (Hemiptera: Liviidae)

Currently, the control of the disease Huanglongbing (HLB) or greening is based mainly on the chemical control of the insect vector Diaphorina citri, through intensive applications of insecticides, which has been causing secondary pest outbreaks, pest resurgence, selection of population resistant and elimination of natural enemies. The goal of this work was to evaluate the possibility of using the curry leaf (Murraya koenigii) as a trap crop for the management of the D. citri. For this, the following tests have been performed: i) Transmission test of \'Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus\' to determine if the curry leaf is not a host for the bacterium; ii) test of choice behavior, to verify the host preference of D. citri to curry leaves in relation to citrus plants; iii) test of probing behavior in curry leaf using the Electrical Penetration Graphs (EPG) technique, in order to understand the feeding of the insect on this plant; iv) selection of systemic insecticides for use in curry leaf, determining the residual period and efficiency; and v) test with trap crop in a citrus orchard, in which curry plants were installed in front of the citrus plants and the psyllid was monitored with the yellow stick traps. As a result, it has been observed that the curry leaf is not a host to \'Ca. L. asiaticus\' by the D. citri inoculation and, in a free choice and olfactometer test, is more attractive to the psyllid than the citrus plant under laboratory conditions. The probing behavior of the psyllid in curry leaf is different from citrus and orange jasmine, being the ingestion of xylem sap in curry leaf higher. In addition, the insecticides applied by \'drench\' such as thiamethoxam and imidacloprid in these plants are efficient against D. citri for more than 70 days after application and, in the field, the capture of psyllids in the plots with the curry leaf was higher and could therefore conclude that, the curry leaf M. koenigii is a potencial plant to be used as a trap crop for the management of D. citri and consequently, the disease HLB. (AU)