Abstract:To understand the influence and action evaluation of the scale insects and functional groups of natural enemies on jujube trees by intercropped herbage at jujube forestry, a systematic survey was made at the jujube forestry with different treatments located west of Taigu (111°32′E, 37°26′N, 788.9 m elevation), Shanxi Province in 2007. The three of the four different treatments at jujube forestry were intercropped with herbage (Astrugalus complanatus) and managed with IPM, conventional pest management and without any pest management separately. The fourth one wasn′t intercropped with any herbage and with conventional pest management. In each of the all different treatments of jujube forestry, five trees were chosen according to the chessboard sampling method to monitor the population dynamics of the natural enemies and pests. The trees were monitored every 10 days from March 10th to September 30th. Each of all four treatments was replicated three times. The natural enemies and scale insects were distinguished based on their trophic relationships and taxonomy. Indices of abundance and diversity of the functional groups of natural enemies and scale insects were used to analyze and compare the influence and action evaluation of the enemy functional groups and scale insects for all different treatments. Breadth and overlapped of two-dimensional temporal-spatial niches and relational grade were compared.
The systematic survey showed that there were significant difference (P<0.05) of the diversity and abundance and breadth and overlapped of two-dimensional temporal-spatial niches and relational grade of the scale insects and functional groups of natural enemies on the trees at the different types of jujube forestry. The result suggested that jujube forestry with herbage have obvious effect to the structure and dynamics of the scale insects and functional groups of natural enemies on jujube trees. The jujube forestry with herbage could improve the population of functional groups of natural enemies which had been severely reduced by spraying of the widespectrum insecticides. The controlling abilities of parasitic natural enemies to scale insects was better in jujube forestry with herbage than that without herbage. So the jujube forestry with herbage is of great benefit to the biological control of the pests. The results from relational grade suggested that the controlling abilities of the enemy functional groups to the pests were better in the jujube forestry with herbage than that without herbage. The result from relativity mensuration showed that study of the scale insects and natural enemy community could be conducted by using functional groups in stead of species.