38th Annual Meeting of the Society for Invertebrate Pathology

New Zealand is an island nation with unique indigenous flora and fauna. Recent history has demonstrated that the exclusion of exotic insect species is important to maintain the health of natural ecosystems and economic production in this agricultural-based country. In the last decade incursions of four lepidopteran species, the white spotted tussock moth, Orgyia thyellina, the painted apple moth, Teia anartoides, gypsy moth, Lymantria dispar, and, most recently, fall webworm, Hyphantria cunea, have been discovered. Eradication programmes have been undertaken using a range of tools including delimiting surveys, trapping, ground searches and aerial operations utilising Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki. Eradication has been declared for white spotted tussock moth and Asian gypsy moth. Painted apple moth is timetabled to be declared eradicated in January 2006. These programmes, led by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF), involved many areas of operation in addition to the pest control aspects, such as economic and environmental impact assessments, human health risk assessments, health surveillance and monitoring studies, and stakeholder communications. In addition, eradication projects (using S-methoprene and B. thuringiensis israelensis) are being conducted by the Ministry of Health for the exotic salt marsh mosquito (Ochlerotatus camptorhynchus), a potential vector for Ross River virus disease.