Integrated pest management, or IPM, is a process you can use to solve pest problems while minimizing risks to people and the environment. IPM can be used to manage all kinds of pests anywhere—in urban, agricultural, and wildland or natural areas.
Everyone manages pests. Whether as a part of life in one’s residence or as a professional occupation managing pests in buildings, farms, and natural areas. Pest management practices cause economic, human-health, and environmental risks. Examples include costs of doing something that does not work or does not work well, worker exposure to pesticides, and increased soil erosion from soil cultivation for weed management. What we need to remember is that every pest management decision, including a decision not to act, involves risks. Pests themselves cause economic, human-health, and environmental risks. Spots from apple scab make an otherwise saleable apple into a cull. Cockroaches in buildings cause allergens to those who live and work there. Bark beetles increase fire danger by killing pine trees. The goal of IPM is to minimize the risks while managing pests to a level acceptable in the situation. The acceptable number of rats in a residence may be zero, whereas the acceptable number of alfalfa weevils per sweep net sample may be twenty. In each pest situation, whether in communities, agricultural production or natural areas, we need to consider risks from the pests and risks from the pest management practices.
What we need to remember is that every pest management decision, including a decision not to act, involves risks.
UC IPM provides Californians with information and decision-support tools needed to minimize risks. In the 2017 Highlights annual report you will see new research and extension on white grubs in turf, demonstration IPM programs for bed bugs, factors influencing the resurgence of San Jose scale in cherry, and testing glyphosate alternatives for effectiveness. Each of these projects focus on a specific aspect of IPM for specific pests in specific situations. Each project was conducted in the context of an overall IPM program that includes accurate pest identification, steps to prevent infestation, monitoring of pest numbers, determination of acceptable populations, and integration of control methods that are targeted and effective. And each project is an incremental step toward reducing the risks from pests and pest management practices. These incremental steps, aggregated over many years, are the basis for continual improvements in our ability to manage pests while protecting California’s people, environment, and economy.