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Abstract: Mushroom growers in the United States, in contrast to growers of other horticultural crops, are restricted as to materials and methods of controlling their animal pest problems. This is because mushrooms are more susceptible to chemical injury than most horticultural crops, because considerable data are needed to obtain United States Department of Agriculture usage labels and to establish United States Food and Drug Administration tolerances, and because only a few people have worked on the pest control phase of mushroom culture. DDT, methoxychlor, malathion, Diazinon, DDVP, and pyrethrum have been the commonly used pesticides in recent years. Of these materials, all but pyrethrum have been applied as residuals to walls, sideboards, and other surfaces previous to casing, and only malathion and pyrethrum have been generally used as dusts on producing beds. Experiences with the residual method of control indicate that the pesticides break down during the first few weeks after application, leaving little or no protection thereafter. Also, it has been observed that sciarid and phorid flies can complete their life cycles without coming in contact with the residual pesticides. Experiments with a 4% malathion plus 0.1% pyrethrum dust applied daily at the rate of 1 pound of dust formulation per 2,000 square feet of bed, demonstrate that once a high population of sciarid or phorid flies is established, it is virtually impossible to wipe it out by this method of control.
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