It's a bug-eat-bug world for Jack and Jake Blehm.
The father and son breed good insects to eat bad insects at Rincon Vitova, one of 15 "insectaria" nationwide. Every day, Rincon produces more than 80 million voracious critters, from ladybugs to wasps. Business has tripled in the past five years as farmers concerned about pesticides turn to natural options.Sales from the 15 insectaria total $25 million a year, the Blehms say. Most insects are sold to cotton and vegetable growers, plus backyard farmers.
"This is the future," said Ken Hagen, an entomologist at the University of California, Berkeley. "There is a great need. The farmers are desperate."
They're so desperate that some universities are adding classes on integrated pest management - ways to hold down troublesome pests while cutting the use of pesticides. The Association of Applied Insect Ecologists, a trade group, is producing a video showing farmers how to work with such insects.
Controlling pests with beneficial insects takes longer, and because pesticides kill good bugs along with bad, farmers are forced to stop chemical spraying while waiting for the good bugs to do their duty.
"The hardest thing for the farmer is to have enough faith," Jake Blehm said. "He's not used to seeing pests in the field; he's used to a quick knockdown.
"With this method, you have to watch for several weeks before you see a difference. And at the beginning, all the farmer sees is that his crop is contaminated with bugs."
Rincon Vitova sells 15 species including beetles, mites and parasitic wasps that control flies around chickens and cattle. It even sells to moviemakers. A studio needed four gallons of maggots last summer. "We shipped them Federal Express to their location site in Montana," Jake Blehm said.