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16

Attraction to baits

Attempts were made to find an earwig bait that would attract large numbers of individuals to the traps and also one that would be consistent enough to use in experimental field tests for the purpose of determining the effectiveness of chemicals.

Crumb and associates (1941) had obtained successful results in luring earwigs to traps with fish oil. When this substance was used in Logan in a preliminary attempt to obtain specimens for laboratory use, it attracted only relatively few. The chance application of peanut butter to one of the traps drew a greater number than had been obtained with fish oil. This indication of a superior bait was the basis for an experiment whereby three different attractants were divided equally among 12 traps (figure 1) and placed at random through an earwig infested area. The traps were baited with one of the following: fish oil, earwig scent (obtained from macerated insects), peanut butter and four traps had no attractant. Traps were collected on the following morning, counts made in the field, and the traps were re-set in an undisturbed portion of the same general area. A total of four replications of this experiment was conducted and the results tabulated in table 2.

The percentage of the total catch from each bait was as follows: peanut butter, 48.65 per cent} fish oil, 22.04 per cent} earwig scent, 21.13 per cent; and no attractant, 8.08 per cent.