Sex Pheromone of Cocoa Pod Borer, Conopomorpha cramerella: Field Activity Evaluation of Pheromone Formulations in an Indonesia Plantation

Simple Summary We have investigated the efficacy of six different pheromone lures for the cocoa pod borer in Indonesia. The lures provided by the USDA captured more males than the lures manufactured by Alpha Scents when loaded with a 0.1 mg pheromone blend. We increased the lure longevity to 7 months by increasing the Alpha Scents pheromone load to 1 mg. The long-life pheromone lure may be particularly useful in monitoring large-scale cocoa farms and developing new mitigation technologies that would necessitate high longevity powerful attractant. The previously identified female sex pheromone of cocoa pod borer (CPB), Conopomorpha cramerella (Snellen) (Lepidoptera: Gracillariidae), was re-evaluated for male attraction using six different pheromone formulations in Indonesian cocoa plantations. In a dose-response experiment, the 0.1 mg pheromone load was significantly more attractive to male CPB than the lower doses tested. Additionally, during the first four-week trapping period, USDA (Beltsville, MD, USA) lures containing 0.1 mg of synthetic pheromone blend exhibited significantly better attraction than the commercial lure obtained from Alpha Scents, Inc. (Canby, OR, USA) with the same pheromone load (0.1 mg). Although the 1.0 mg lure did not show any higher attraction than the 0.1 mg lure during the first month, it was significantly attractive for CPB males with the same weekly average capture efficacy for the whole twenty-seven weeks in field conditions in 2018. A long-life pheromone lure can be particularly useful in monitoring large-scale cocoa farms.