Selection of suitable cereal cultivar as living mulch for retentionof natural enemiesof pests of Welsh onion

We tested two cultivars of barley and one of wheat as living mulch for the retention of indigenous natural enemies of pests of winter-harvested Welsh onion. ‘Hyakumangoku’ barley withered earliest and was therefore most suitable to precede soil hilling for the blanching of the onions in early September; it supported populations of Rhopalosiphum padi (Linnaeus) and Anaphothrips obscurus (Müller), which are food sources for the indigenous natural enemy Geocoris proteus Distant, and various predatory phytoseiid mites.