Insecticide Susceptibility of Field-collected Blattella germanica (Blattaria: Blattalidae) in Busan, Republic of Korea during 2014

The susceptibility values for field-collected (BG-BG) and laboratory (KS-BG) strains of German cockroaches (BS-BG), Blattella germanica (L.) to five synthetic pyrethroid and three organophosphate insecticides were assessed by topical application. Both KS-BG and BS-BG strains demonstrated the highest levels of susceptibility to deltamethrin with LD50 values of 0.0035 μg/female and 1.5744 μg/female, respectively. The KS-BG strain demonstrated the lowest susceptibility level to fenthion with an LD50 value of 0.0698 μg/female, while the BS-BG field population showed the lowest susceptibility to bifenthrin with 4.6811 μg/female. The BS-BG field population showed resistance levels of 50 to 640 fold higher against the eight pesticides evaluated compared to the KS-BG strain. The resistance ratios (RR) of the eight pesticides were compared using populations of B. germanica that were collected from the same locality during 2007 and 2014. The field population of B. germanica collected during 2014 demonstrated significantly high resistance to an organophosphates and all pyrethroids when compared with those collected during 2007, but RR values were <10 except for chlorpyrifos-methyl and chlorpyrifos with RR values of 74 and 104, respectively.