Commercial Development & Evaluation of Cucurbitacin

The corn rootworm is one of the most serious pests on corn in the U.S. Growers routinely apply soil insecticide to 50-60% of the 30 million acres of corn annually to control corn rootworm. Insecticides are routinely applied prophylactically and are frequently unnecessary, and may cause imposed health risks to growers, livestock and wildlife, in addition to possible ground water and environmental contamination. Losses and control costs due to the corn rootworm can exceed $1 billion dollars per year. Florida Food Products, Inc., in cooperation with USDA, identified and extracted cucubitacin E. glycoside, a corn rootworm feeding stimulant/arrestant from Hawkesbury bitter watermelon (BHW), known as Invite¿ . In Phase I, the feasibility of commercially extracting and concentrating the BHW juice was demonstrated, and its efficacy was proven in a bait formulation with 90-95% reduction in rates of insecticides. It was also shown for the first time that Invite¿ could be used effectively in combination with a number of different insecticides at reduced rates. The proposed program is directed at the commercial production of Invite¿ in combination with reduced insecticides, and will be applied on 500,000 acres of corn in the U.S.