Nano-attack beats the borer beetle
It seems the global scramble for a solution to the havoc caused by the tree-killing shot-hole borer beetle – the destruction of which has been widely covered by Knysna-Plett Herald – has finally ended after a small South African company finally found a way to stem its killing spree.
Until the announcement by Pan African Farms in the small Free State town of Parys last week about its breakthrough in June, there had apparently been no way to stop the silent assassin – which is responsible for the devastation of Knysna’s oak-lined avenues and the death of many other trees, and which has cut a swathe through vegetation all across the world.
Strangling trees
Inadvertently imported from South-East Asia some years ago presumably via ships carrying wooden packing pallets, according to reports, the tiny 2mm-long critter funnels into trees leaving a fungus – used to feed its offspring in its wake – which strangles the plant’s vascular tracts.
Some projections of Johannesburg’s plight report nearly 2-million trees in danger.
With only Limpopo province remaining beetle-free since it was discovered in the country in 2017, South African experts joined others worldwide in a desperate search for a solution. And now the treatment discovered by scientists in the small Free State outpost has received a thumbs-up from the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries making it applicable as a bona fide agricultural remedy.
Nano to the rescue
In an interview with KPH sister publication The Citizen last week, Pan African Farms’ CEO Piet Meyer explained how they came up with an eco-friendly solution, by using nanotechnology which produces vesicles (miniscule vacuous sacs) small enough to penetrate the layer of fungus left by the beetle and launch a series of attacks on a cellular level.
“Our vesicle , as far as I could determine, is the smallest in the world, at 10 nanometres,”‘ he explained. “To give you some perspective: the smallest living cell is 10 microns. Our vesicle is 1 000 times smaller than that.”
This enables it to penetrate through most known barriers including the cell wall of the fungus that was formerly considered to be impenetrable. “They are boere (farmers),” Meyer joked with KPH on Tuesday explaining that the beetle’s source of nutrition is its presumably self-generated Fusarium fungus. The only way to kill this polyphagous beetle is thus to kill its food source by way of the microscopic vesicles.
‘Non-toxic and natural’
The new technologically developed counter-measure has an advantage over other fungicides – which are labour-intensive and often become ineffective as resistance is built up against them and pests adapt – as a non-toxic, natural active ingredient that will not harm the tree, according to Meyer. He added that within 24 hours of applying the product to the bark of an infected tree, no trace of the fungus could be found and the insects “poured out of the trees in droves”.
Immediately allaying fears that the insects would then seek out other trees as a feeding ground and spread again, Meyer told KPH, “No, we monitored the beetles very carefully. They are free of any fungus (food source) and all perish within minutes after emerging. Even the larvae come out and die.”
Asked how he feels about this international breakthrough by his humble facility in a small-town lab, Meyer remained surprisingly humble: “We’re just doing our job,” he said.
Read previous articles here:
- Knysna manages to escape the mighty tree-killer bug – for now
- Borer beetle task force launched
- Tiny beetle is killing SA’s trees
- Destructive beetle spreads to the Heads
- Beetle ravages indigenous trees
- Killer beetle invades Knysna trees
- Killer beetles invade Knysna trees
- Knysna’s dying oak trees in Spotlight
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Source: Knysna Plett Herald News