Focus Group IPM for brassica

Brassica crops may be infested and infected by a wide range of pest and pathogen species. For example, as many as 50 species of insect from several orders (Diptera, Coleoptera, Lepidoptera, Thysanoptera, Hemiptera) are considered to be Brassica pests. Some of these species are specialists in that they colonise plants from the Brassicaceae and close relatives, whilst others, such as Myzus persicae are generalists and colonise hosts from a range of plant families. Plant pathogens are Brassica specific, with none of the main fungal, viral, or bacterial species listed elsewhere in the report having host species outside cruciferous plants. Brassica crops are also invariably challenged by pressure from weed species, which are from a diversity of plant families.