Daniel A. Potter

Our Vision

• Provide research leadership for environmentally responsible solutions to insects impacting  plants in urban and suburban landscapes including lawns, golf courses, sport fields, street and shade trees, parks, pastures, nurseries, and other settings
• Enhance basic understanding of pests and beneficial insects, their interactions with plants in urban landscapes, and their responses to anthropogenic disturbances , especially pesticide inputs
•  Conduct hypothesis-driven innovative work in conservation biological control, eco-toxicology, urban biodiversity conservation, host plant resistance, and tri-trophic interactions using turf and landscape study systems
• Develop future leaders in Urban Landscape Entomology through commitment to  graduate education

We interact with professional landscape and turf managers, industry and government scientists, and the public.  Grad students gain independent research skills as well as extensive teaching, extension, and outreach experience, opening diverse career opportunities.  Nearly all of our graduates have gone on to rewarding scientific careers in academia, state or federal positions, or in industry.

We have inordinate fondness for soil insects, especially scarab grubs, as well as Japanese beetles, caterpillars, wood borers, scale insects, leaf miners, ants, earthworms, and other invertebrates important to urban ecosystems. Another focus is on conservation of beneficial insects, including pollinators, and their ecosystem services.  New systems are readily taken on in response to students' interests and emerging pest problems.  

On my web site you will find a brief personal biography, examples of past and present research projects, a list of selected recent publications from our lab, information about current and past graduate students, and brief descriptions of courses that I teach.

Some Accomplishments of Students from Our Lab:

• 40 past and present graduate students
• Three recipients of John H. Comstock Award, ESA’s most prestigious graduate student recognition
• Seven recipients of UK College of Agriculture Outstanding Grad Student Award
• ESA Leadership Award in Applied Entomology, ESA President’s Prize, ESA scholarships, GCSAA Watson Fellowship, prestigious University fellowships, 18 winners in OVEA Student Paper Competition
• Former students include 9 University faculty members; leaders in Industry, USDA, State Extension and Regulatory positions, and lawn and landscape consultants and/or business owners.  
• >70% of the nearly 200 refereed scientific papers originating from our lab had student(s) as the primary (first) author.

• Dobbs EK and DA Potter. 2015. Forging natural links with golf courses for pollinator-related conservation, outreach, teaching, and research. American Entomologist 61: 116–123.
• Larson JL, Redmond CT, Potter DA (2015). Mowing mitigates bioactivity of neonicotinoid insecticides in nectar of flowering lawn weeds and turfgrass guttation. Environ. Toxicol. Chem 34:127-132
• Dobbs EK, Potter DA (2014) Conservation biological control and pest performance in lawn turf: Does mowing height matter? Environmental Management 53: 648-659.
• Larson JL, Kesheimer AJ, Potter DA (2014). Pollinator assemblages on dandelion and white clover in urban and suburban lawns. J. Insect Conservation 18:863-873
• Lee DW and DA Potter. 2015. Biological control of the black cutworm, Agrotis ipsilon (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) with the Korean entomopathogenic nematode, Steinernema carpocapsae GSNI Strain in turfgrasses.Weed & Turfgr. Sci.58–64.
• Larson JL, Redmond CT, Potter DA (2013) Assessing Insecticide Hazard to Bumble Bees Foraging on Flowering Weeds in Treated Lawns. PLoS ONE 8(6):e66375. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0066375JL
• Potter DA, Redmond CT (2013) Relative resistance or susceptibility of landscape suitable elms (Ulmus spp.) to multiple insect pests. Arboric. & Urban Forestry 39: 236–243
• Potter DA, Williams DW, Redmond CT (2013). Management of excessive earthworm casts on golf courses and sport fields. Int. Turfgrass Soc. Res. J. 12: 347-355.
• Lee DW, Potter DA (2013) Effect of essential oils and paraffin oil on the black cutworm, Agrotis ipsilon. Weed Turf Sci. 2:62-69
• Redmond CT, Kesheimer A Potter DA (2014) Earthworm community structure, population dynamics, and seasonal casting activity on Kentucky golf courses. Appl. Soil Ecol. 75: 116–123.
• Larson JL, Redmond CT, Potter DA (2014) Impacts of a neonicotinoid, neonicotinoid–pyrethroid premix, and anthranilic diamide insecticide on four species of turf inhabiting beneficial insects. Ecotoxicology 23: 252-259
• Seagraves BL, Redmond CT, Potter DA (2012) Relative resistance or susceptibility of maple (Acer) species, hybrids, and cultivars to six arthropod pests of production nurseries. Pest Manag. Sci. In Press.
• Redmond CT, Williams DW, Potter DA (2012) Comparison of scarab grub populations and associated pathogens and parasitoids in warm or cool-season in warm- or cool-season grasses used on transitional-zone golf courses. J. Econ. Entomol. In Press.
• Held DW, Potter DA (2012) Prospects for managing turfgrass pests with reduced chemical inputs. Annu. Rev. Entomol. 57: 329-54.
• Keathley CP, Harrison RL, Potter DA (2012) Baculovirus infection of the armyworm (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) feeding on spiny- or smooth-edged grass (Festuca spp.) leaf blades. Biol. Control 61: 147-54.
• Keathley CP, Potter DA (2012). Arthropod abundance in tall fescue pastures containing novel “safe” endophytes. Ann. Appl. Biol. DOI: 10.1111/j.1439-0418.2011.01698.x
• Larson JL, Redmond CT, Potter DA (2012). Comparative impact of an anthranilic diamide and other insecticidal chemistries on beneficial invertebrates and ecosystem services in turf. Pest Manag. Sci. 68: 740-748.
• Bixby-Brosi AJ, Potter DA (2011) Endophyte-mediated tritrophic interactions between a grass-feeding caterpillar and two parasitoid species with different life histories. Arthopod-Plant Interactions 6: 27-34.
• Bixby-Brosi AJ, Potter DA (2012) Can a chitin-synthesis-inhibiting turfgrass fungicide enhance black cutworm susceptibility to a baculovirus? Pest Manag. Sci. 68: 324-29
• Keathley CP, Potter DA (2011). Behavioral plasticity of a grass-feeding caterpillar in response to spiny or smooth-edged leaf blades. Arthropod-Plant Interactions 5: 339-49.
• Condra J, Brady C, Potter DA (2010). Resistance of landscape-suitable elms to Japanese beetle, gall aphids, and leaf miners, with notes on life history of Orchestes alni and Agromyza aristata in Kentucky. Arboric. Urban For. 36:101-09.
• Hammons DL, Kurtural SK, Potter DA (2010) Phenological resistance of grapes to the green June beetle, an obligate fruit-eating scarab. Ann. Appl. Biol. 156: 271-279.
• Potter D.A. et al. (2010) Managing earthworm casts (Oligochaeta: Lumbricidae) in turfgrass using a natural byproduct of tea oil (Camellia sp.) manufacture. Pest Manag. Sci. 66:439-46.
• Bixby AJ, Potter D.A. (2010). Influence of endophyte (Neotyphodium lolii) infection of perennial ryegrass on susceptibility of the black cutworm (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) to a baculovirus. Biological Control, 54: 141-146.
• Bixby-Brosi AJ, Potter DA (2010) Evaluating a naturally-occurring baculovirus for extended biological control of the black cutworm (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) in golf course habitats. J. Econ. Entomol. 103:1555-63.
• Vanek, SJ, Potter DA (2010) An interesting case of ant-created enemy-free space for magnolia scale (Hemiptera: Coccidae). J. Insect Behavior 23: 389-395.
• Vanek, SJ, Potter DA (2010) Ant-exclusion to promote biological control of soft scales (Hemiptera: Coccidae) on woody landscape plants. Environ. Entomol. 39:1829-37.
• Hammons DL, Kurtural SK, Potter DA (2010) Japanese beetle defoliation reduced primary bud cold hardiness during vineyard establishment. Am. J. Enology and Viticulture 61:130-34.
• Redmond CT, Potter DA (2010) Incidence of turf-damaging white grubs and associated pathogens and parasitoids on Kentucky golf courses. Environ. Entomol. 39:1838-47.
• Hammons DL, Kurtural SK, Potter DA (2010) Impact of insecticide-manupulated defoliation by Japanse beetle (Popillia japonica) on grapevines from vineyard establishment through production. Pest Manag. Sci. 66: 565-571
• Hammons DL, Kurtural SK, Newman MC, Potter DA (2009) Invasive Japanese beetles facilitate aggregation and injury by a native scarab pest of ripening fruits. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. 106: 3686–3691.

Revised: 20 Oct 2015