New investigations in the massive rearing of Hypothenemus hampei and its parasitoids Cephalonomia stephanoderis and Prorops nasuta

Abstract

The parasitoids rearing unit for the control of the coffee berry borer in Sandona (Nariño, Co­lombia), was created to introduce the species Cephalonomia stephanoderis and Prorops nasuta from Ecuador and to develop a reli­able methodology to produce these insects in a massive form. The methodology is based on the production of the coffee berry borer on dry cof­fee beans recently benefited, which receives a treatment to avoid infestation by fungi and acari and put them with newly emerged borer adults in the proportion of 2 borer/grain. The effi­ciency of the borer to infest the grain is 85% and the loss by contamination is 7%. The efficiency of the boring grain is 90%; from each boring grain emerge four parasitoids. Tempera­ture of the production room is about 25-27°C and relative humidity above 70%. The Produc­tion Unit of Sandona produced 5.200.000 wasps of C. stephanotis and 200.000 of P. nasuta between January and october/1993. This unit will introduce to the system 60 kg of dry coffee to bore, which which will produce about 3.000.000 wasps of C. stephanoderis month. Now, the methodology is available to the private enterprise in order to produce these species on a commercial form.