"Every year, navel orangeworms eat through roughly 2% of California’s almonds before they can make it to grocery store shelves. With climate change threatening to make the situation worse, researchers are hoping to sterilize millions of moths a day with radiation and drop them from airplanes."

"PARLIER, Calif. — In a windowless shack on the far outskirts of Fresno, an ominious red glow illuminates a lab filled with X-ray machines, shelves of glowing boxes, a quietly humming incubator and a miniature wind tunnel.

While the scene looks like something straight out of a sci-fi movie, its actually part of an experimental program to prevent a damaging almond pest from successfully mating.

With California almond growers reeling from dropping nut prices and rising costs, the pests have only added to their woes."

Noah Haggerty reports for the Los Angeles Times October 7, 2024. [2]