Performance of Imidacloprid or Phorate Co-Applied In-Furrow with Superabsorbent Polymer and Evaluation of Aldicarb

Management decisions mitigating thrips injury and tomato spotted wilt infection are primarily limited to being enacted at the beginning of the growing season. Previous work explored corresponding potential management contribution of concurrent insecticide application with a superabsorbent polymer in-furrow but reported effects to be marginal or variable across experiments. To more thoroughly probe this potential, data from a collection of 40 experiments conducted from 2009 through 2022 was analyzed to examine the efficacy of insecticides (aldicarb, imidacloprid, imidacloprid plus fluopyram, and phorate, in addition to a nontreated check) applied in-furrow at planting for peanut production. In addition to treatments applied individually, experiments included imidacloprid (n = 11) or phorate (n = 18) applied in the presence of 2.2 kg/ha superabsorbent polymer. Results indicated that neither imidacloprid nor phorate alone significantly varied with regard to stand count (P > 0.35), thrips injury (P > 0.27), tomato spotted wilt incidence (P > 0.08), or yield (P > 0.37) when compared to their co-application with the polymer. These results were consistent across variety susceptibility levels to tomato spotted wilt. The fitted models were determined to be robust to the treatment composition of screened studies (P > 0.089). Where there were differences in projected returns above the nontreated check, phorate or aldicarb were the most consistently profitable treatments.