The insect glue, produced from edible oils, was inspired by plants such as sundews that use the strategy to capture their prey. A key advantage of physical pesticides over toxic pesticides is that pests are highly unlikely to evolve resistance, as this would require them to develop much larger and stronger bodies, while bigger beneficial insects, like bees, are not trapped by the drops.
The drops were tested on the western flower thrip, which are known to attack more than 500 species of vegetable, fruit and ornamental crops. More than 60% of the thrips were captured within the two days of the test, and the drops remained sticky for weeks.
Work on the sticky pesticide is continuing, but Dr Thomas Kodger at Wageningen University & Research, in the Netherlands, who is part of the self defence project doing the work, said: “We hope it will have not nearly as disastrous side-effects on the local environment or on accidental poisonings of humans. And the alternatives are much worse, which are potential starvation due to crop loss or the overuse of chemical pesticides, which are a known hazard.”
I'm not fighting you. It's just you're acting as if the reason we research pesticides isn't because we need it to protect our food source.
I'm not even saying that there isn't some possible alternative, I'm just saying monoculture grains is how humanity gets most of its calories right now. It's how we currently survive. That requires pesticides. These pesticides are far less damaging to the world than the current ones in use right now. It's in the research phase too, so it's not like we're committing to this specific idea. Everyone knows there are pros and cons, the scientists doing the research do too. You're not the first person to realise that this will trap all small insects. Just a reminder that our current solution kills all insects and this one is better. The fact it doesn't harm bees is already a massive improvement.
Everyone should be welcome and encouraged to research any idea that's better than our current ideas in any way. Any knowledge is good knowledge.
As for your preferred ideas? There are lots of ways to help be part of a future that includes what you feel is the best solution. That being said, none of them include being disingenuous about why we use pesticides in the first place. I don't know why that was contentious to you. We don't kill bugs because they're gross, we kill them because they eat our food.