Insects and Society

We share this planet with a million or more other species of organisms. Most of us only come in contact with a tiny fraction of the insect biodiversity on the planet and unfortunately many of our contacts are with insect pests. A pest is an organism that reduces the availability, quality, or value of some human resource. This resource may be a plant or animal used for food, fiber, or recreation. The resource may also be a person’s health and personal well being.

A large group of insect species feed on insect pest species and plant pests (weeds). Humans have recognized the beneficial actions of these insect species for centuries. Biological control is the action of natural enemies (predators, parasitoids, herbivores, and pathogens), which act to reduce populations of another insect. This suppression can be both naturally occurring and brought about by human intervention. We will consider three types of natural enemies in this course: predators, parasitoids, and herbivores.