FORT PIERCE, Florida — Just off of North Kings Highway, a dirt road once led to lush rows of sweet-smelling citrus crops: grapefruits, lemons and oranges. Now, all that’s left of the once-flourishing groves are barren rows of dead trees, weeds and a few sickly fruits still clutching to their final nutrients. Florida was once a global capital for citrus production. But in 1998, a state entomologist discovered a tiny insect called the Asian citrus psyllid (Diaphorina citri). It was an ominous sign; the invasive pest transmits a pathogen that causes citrus greening disease, or Huanglongbing, which slowly kills the trees and turns the fruit bitter. It took seven more years to identify the first confirmed case. Over the past two decades, the disease has virtually decimated the state’s industry. Projections for this year’s orange production, the most abundant citrus crop grown in Florida, sit at just under 20 million boxes — down from more than 200 million boxes in the early 2000s, before the disease had spread. Since then, the world’s leading scientists have poured endless time and money into rescue efforts, including mesh protective covers to block the pest from infecting young trees, disease-tolerant hybrid varieties, and antibiotic trunk injections. Yet the disease continues spreading. A largely dead grapefruit grove infected with citrus greening disease in Fort Pierce, Florida. Image by Marlowe Starling for Mongabay. Now, a team from Argentina is testing a cheaper and simpler technique to control psyllids — sometimes called jumping plant lice — in…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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