Determining the associated Dipteran flies in Volvariella volvacea mushroom cultivation is important since these flies are purportedly potential pests of mushrooms especially their immature stages. To address this, mushroom bed establishment, and adult fly sampling at different growth stages of V. volvacea mushrooms by net-sweeping and use of sticky boards were done at weekly intervals. Net-sweeping revealed catches of adult flies which were identified using appropriate taxonomic keys, but insects collected by sticky boards were mutilated and identification was not possible.Eight species of flies found exhibited the breadth of dipteran diversity; three families represented the suborder Nematocera (Scatopsidae, Sciaridae and Empididae) and five of the suborder Brachycera namely, Mycophila (Cecidomyiidae), Pipunculus (Pipunculidae), Porcenus (Heleomyzidae), Leptocera (Sphaeroceridae), and Desmometopa (Milichiidae). The most abundant fly was Desmometopa in the eight weekly samplings done signifying that the mushroom substrate is supporting this fly population. Desmometopa, as well as Porcenus and Scatopsidae flies are known detritivores while Sciaridae and Cecidomyiidae represented by Mycophila are known fungivores.. Pipunculus and the Empididae fly are endoparasite and predator, respectively.

Habitat manipulation aims to conserve insect population on agricultural landscapes by augmenting and conserving the population of natural enemies of pests or biological control agents. The study aimed to evaluate the effect of habitat manipulation on the yield of soybean by assessing the population of insects and other associated arthropods. Companion planting of Tagetes with soybean using inter-row and border row planting designs was followed. A total of 4, 388 individuals representing 11 insect Orders, and 128 species were collected through net sweeping and yellow sticky board traps. These two methods of insect collection were further compared using the two-planting designs. Border row planting design revealed a low population of insect pests, and thus better than the inter-row design. Also, higher number of biological control agents such as coccinellids was found in these plots than in soybean inter-row with Tagetes erecta, and soybean alone.

The fixed insoluble Phosphorus in the soil limits its utilization by crops and thus, the role of phosphate solubilizing bacteria (PSB) is beneficial to increase the P availability in the soil for crops. In order to obtain native isolates that may be used for onion production, three (3) major onion-producing provinces in the Philippines were selected to collect soil samples. A laboratory experiment was carried out to isolate probable PSB employing Pikovskaya (PK) medium with tricalcium phosphate. From a total of 157 isolates that showed a halo zone on PK plates, three (3) representative isolates (one from each location) were selected based on their population dominance and halo zone size for genetic identification using 16S rRNA sequencing. The isolated PSB strains from the three sites showed highly similar nucleotide sequences with Acinetobacter baumannii. In terms of ability to solubilize Phosphorus, the Mindoro Occidental isolate (MOc PSB-RGL-2023) showed the highest solubilizing index of 3.42 mm, followed by Ilocos Sur (IS PSB-RGL-2023) with 3.2 mm, and Nueva Ecija (NE PSB-RGL-2023) with 2.7 mm. These findings suggest the potential of Acinetobacter baumanii as bioinoculant for improving P availability. This study provides a valuable insight as the pioneer report that isolated and characterized possible A. baumannii strains from the three provinces in the Philippines as a prospective PSB bioinoculant.