Question: What do Pests do to crops?

Hugh Roderick answered on 17 Jun 2010:

The specific pests I work on are nematodes, which are little worms that burrow through the roots of plants. They are a particular problem for banana plants because the plant isn’t able to defend itself from them. Because they are burrowing through the root, eating as they go, they cause the root to die and fungus can get into the root and cause more root to die. The result of this is that the roots aren’t able to provide enough of the nutrients that the plant needs to grow, so the plants are smaller and produce less fruit. When there are lots and lots of worms, which is what happens if the farmer doesn’t do anything to get rid of the nematodes, enough roots can be destroyed that the plant can no longer support itself so it falls over and dies.

There are also other insect pests that lay their eggs on the stem of banana and the baby insects then burrow through the stem causing the stem to break and the plant to die. There are many different types of nematode and insect that do similar damage to almost all the crops that we grow to feed ourselves, and as a result a lot of very nasty chemicals get sprayed onto our crops to stop them being killed.