The challenges of monitoring insect sleeper pests: the example of Spodoptera litura (tropical armyworm) in New Zealand

Abstract

Farmers will face a different suite of insect pests under climate change. Monitoring their population dynamics over time is important for risk assessment and mitigation, but it can be expensive and time-consuming, and published information can be sparse. To highlight this issue, we investigated suitable sources of such information on Spodoptera litura (tropical armyworm), a potential sleeper pest in New Zealand. After appropriate quality checks and analyses, data from two online platforms, iNaturalist and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), indicated higher numbers and an extended geographical range for S. litura in 2018 and 2022-23. This example suggests that these platforms could be a useful tool for future pest monitoring.