The 2021 Gaps & Opportunities Assessment Report summarizes resources, monitoring activities, and research related to agriculturally relevant pests, pollinators, and beneficial insects on Vancouver Island. Gaps, opportunities, and priorities are identified, and climate change considerations are included; the report provides a guide for implementing supports for Vancouver Island producers.
The main priorities identified for implementation were:
- Increasing grower awareness and use of existing resources
- Increasing grower knowledge of, and support for, implementing climate change resiliency practices, such as new resources to fill gaps, communication networks, extension and financial support
- Increasing knowledge specific to the Vancouver Island region including baseline monitoring and field research
The 2022 and 2023 Project Reports (2021 and 2022 growing seasons) respond to the lack of Vancouver Island wide monitoring of current pests and beneficial insects. This project had the overarching goal of increasing grower knowledge and engagement with Integrated Pest Management (IPM). IPM is an important tool that can be used to improve pest management in the face of many changing factors, including climate change and the introduction of new pests, as well as allowing for the management of existing pests in a more sustainable way.
The project also collected a substantial amount of data that forms an important baseline for future monitoring in the region.
Project Objectives:
- Implement pest monitoring of key species of concern to Vancouver Island agricultural producers
- Facilitate community and collaborative monitoring of agriculturally significant pollinator and beneficial species
- Communicate monitoring findings to Vancouver Island producers during production season
- Increase producer knowledge and implementation of integrated pest management and beneficial species support resources