Speaker: Raymond A. Cloyd, Ph.D., Professor and Extension Specialist, Kansas State University

Raymond will provide a brief introduction to biological control and will then focus on the importance of quality assessment associated with biological control agents, such as, parasitoids, predators, and entomopathogenic nematodes. Raymond will provide examples of quality assessment based on his research program (over 4 years) related to assessing the quality of commercially available biological control agents including: whitefly parasitoids, aphid parasitoids, and predatory mites. Quality assessment is one of the primary means of ensuring the success of biological control programs in enclosed horticultural cropping systems.