The relationship between predator density, community composition, and field predation of Colorado potato beetle eggs

Conservation biological control programs seek to increase natural enemy densities through the adoption of more benign farming practices, under the assumption that higher predator densities will lead to more effective pest suppression. However, predator–predator interference may lead to diminishing returns in improved pest control as predator densities increase. We examined the relationship between predator density and predation rates on Colorado potato beetle eggs in production potato fields. These potato fields naturally spanned a 10-fold range in predator density, due to differences in management practices. Periodically through the growing season we simultaneously measured predator densities and subjected sentinel eggs masses to predation, allowing us to correlate predator density and egg predation for each field on each sample date. Egg predation rates were significantly positively correlated with total predator densities, a correlation that was not improved when predator densities were scaled to reflect differences in feeding rates on potato beetle eggs of the constituent predator taxa. There was no correlation between per-capita egg predation rates and predator density, and so no evidence that predator interference increased with increasing predator density. We divided predators into six dominant taxa—dwarf spiders, crab spiders, minute pirate bugs, big-eyed bugs, damsel bugs, and Lygus bugs (together constituting 93% of all predators collected), and a seventh group, “other predators” that included all other, less common, taxa—and examined correlations between all predator combinations and egg predation rates. The highest correlation was between combined densities of the six most common predator taxa, excluding only the “other predators” grouping. This suggests that predators may be largely equivalent in their impact on Colorado potato beetle eggs, and that field scouts might be able to ignore uncommon predator taxa when sampling for natural enemies.