{"id":284476,"date":"2018-09-14T06:00:51","date_gmt":"2018-09-13T20:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=284476"},"modified":"2018-09-14T06:00:51","modified_gmt":"2018-09-13T20:00:51","slug":"uog-researchers-take-part-in-confab-on-rhino-beetles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/uog-researchers-take-part-in-confab-on-rhino-beetles\/","title":{"rendered":"UOG researchers  take part  in confab  on\u00a0rhino beetles\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Coconut-Rhinoceros-Beetle.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"473\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-284477\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Researchers\u00a0from Cooperative Extension &amp; Outreach at the\u00a0University of Guam\u00a0recently\u00a0participated in a Pacific-wide discussion on a new type of coconut rhinoceros beetle that is killing coconut and oil palms in Guam, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and other islands of the Pacific.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A symposium\u00a0titled\u00a0\u201cThe challenge of CRB-G to palm production in the Pacific and prospects for microbial control\u201d\u00a0featured the university\u2019s Aubrey\u00a0Moore, Jim Grasela, Roland Quitugua, and Ian Iriarte. The\u00a0discussion took place\u00a0at\u00a0the\u00a0Annual Meeting of the Society for Invertebrate Pathology in Gold Coast, Australia in August 2018.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn Guam, the beetle escaped control following damage caused by Typhoon Dolphin in 2015, which\u00a0left large numbers of CRB-G breeding sites in the form of piles of decaying vegetation,\u201d said Dr. Aubrey Moore, associate professor of entomology. \u201cThe control on Guam will only be possible with the introduction of a self-replicating, density-dependent biocontrol agent.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Outbreaks of CRB-G are out of control in Guam, Papua New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands, and this problematic biotype is spreading to other islands. Other coconut rhinoceros beetle biotypes can be effectively controlled by introducing a naturally occurring virus that only attacks rhino beetles. Unfortunately, CRB-G is resistant to all available isolates of this virus.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The scientists agreed that the most feasible\u00a0way to stop CRB-G from killing palms and spreading to other islands is to find a new isolate of the biocontrol virus that attacks CRB-G and will collaborate on the search for this virus. <strong>(UOG)<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Researchers\u00a0from Cooperative Extension &amp; Outreach at the\u00a0University of Guam\u00a0recently\u00a0participated in a Pacific-wide discussion on a&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":284477,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[11714,51,196,445],"class_list":["post-284476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-aubrey-moore","tag-guam","tag-papua-new-guinea","tag-uog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=284476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/284477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}