Culliney T W, Grace J K
Hawaii Department of Agriculture, Division of Plant Industry, 1428 South King Street, Honolulu, Hawaii 96814, USA.
Bull Entomol Res. 2000 Feb;90(1):9-21.
Costs associated with subterranean termite damage and control are estimated to approach $2 billion annually in the United States alone. The Formosan subterranean termite, Coptotermes formosanus Shiraki, is one of the more economically important subterranean species. In recent years, the shortcomings associated with conventional chemical control methods have prompted policymakers and scientists to evaluate the potential for biological control of subterranean termites (C. formosanus in particular), that is, to determine the potential for natural enemies - predators, parasitoids and pathogens - to suppress termite populations. Ants are the greatest predators of termites, and may have a considerable local impact on termite populations in some areas of the world. A few parasitoids of termites are known, but their potential for regulating termite populations seems negligible. Characteristics of the colony, such as a protected, underground location (and, for the C. formosanus nest, its modular and dispersed nature), are likely to limit the impact predators and parasitoids have on subterranean termites. Thus, there seems little potential for use of these agents for subterranean termite control. For various reasons, pathogenic organisms, such as viruses, bacteria, Protozoa, nematodes and most fungi, have shown little promise for use in biological termite control. However, research suggests that strains of two well-studied, endoparasitic fungi, Beauveria bassiana and Metarhizium anisopliae, when employed in baiting schemes, may offer the potential for at least some measure of subterranean termite control, although their successful use is compromised by a number of inherent biological limitations and logistical problems that have yet to be solved. Although not strictly in the realm of classical biological control, recent studies suggest that natural products, such as ant semiochemicals and fungal metabolites (siderophores), or their synthetic analogues, eventually might find a use in termite control programmes as repellents or insecticides in wood treatments or soil applications if stable formulations can be developed.
仅在美国，与地下白蚁破坏和防治相关的成本估计每年接近20亿美元。台湾乳白蚁（Coptotermes formosanus Shiraki）是经济上较为重要的地下白蚁种类之一。近年来，传统化学防治方法存在的缺点促使政策制定者和科学家评估地下白蚁（特别是台湾乳白蚁）生物防治的潜力，即确定天敌（捕食者、寄生蜂和病原体）抑制白蚁种群数量的潜力。蚂蚁是白蚁最大的捕食者，在世界某些地区可能会对当地的白蚁种群产生相当大的影响。已知有几种白蚁寄生蜂，但它们调节白蚁种群数量的潜力似乎微不足道。蚁群的特性，如受保护的地下位置（对于台湾乳白蚁巢穴而言，其模块化和分散的性质），可能会限制捕食者和寄生蜂对地下白蚁的影响。因此，利用这些生物制剂来防治地下白蚁似乎没有多大潜力。由于各种原因，诸如病毒、细菌、原生动物、线虫和大多数真菌等致病生物在白蚁生物防治中几乎没有显示出应用前景。然而，研究表明两种经过充分研究的内寄生真菌——球孢白僵菌（Beauveria bassiana）和绿僵菌（Metarhizium anisopliae），当用于诱饵策略时，可能至少在一定程度上具有防治地下白蚁的潜力，尽管它们的成功应用受到一些尚未解决的固有生物学限制和后勤问题的影响。虽然不完全属于经典生物防治范畴，但最近的研究表明，如果能够开发出稳定的制剂，天然产物，如蚂蚁信息素和真菌代谢产物（铁载体）或其合成类似物，最终可能会在白蚁防治计划中作为木材处理或土壤应用中的驱避剂或杀虫剂使用。
