Biological Pest Control of a Biscuit Beetle (Stegobium paniceum) Infestation in an Old Masters Paintings Storage Area

ABSTRACT

We report on biological control of an active infestation by biscuit beetles (Stegobium paniceum) of museum objects (Old Masters paintings) in the storage facilities of the Museum of Fine Arts in Vienna. Because chemical and non-chemical treatment methods would have been very problematic, the release of parasitic wasps (Lariophagus distinguendus) was discussed and accepted by the director of the collection. We released 3000 wasps every month from August 2013 until September 2014 in the two infested storage rooms and monitored the activity of biscuit beetles on sticky blunder traps and light traps, and also by visual inspection. In the insect monitoring of 2014 until 2018 no more biscuit beetles were found in the two storage depositories, showing that the treatment was 100% successful. To our knowledge, this is the first proof of a fully successful biological control of a museum pest using parasitoids only, and also of stored product/food pest, outside a laboratory experimental setup. This biological pest control method allowed avoiding negative side effects such as contamination from treatments with biocides, or costly logistics in case of chemical-free methods.

KEYWORDS:

• Museum pests
• monitoring
• integrated pest management
• IPM

Acknowledgements

We thank the Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien for supporting and funding an IPM program and also for its open approach to implement the use of parasitoid wasps in the paintings depository. We also thank Eva Götz, Tanja Kimmel and Sonja Kocian, conservations studios of the KHM for their help in this project and for their collaboration in the IPM program; Mathias Schöller, Stefan Biebl, and Bill Landsberger for discussions on the use of parasitoid wasps in museums; and Louise and Christoph Querner for their help with the English of this text.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Pascal Querner http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3537-0699