Major agricultural chemical manufacturers give all sorts of monikers to new products. They invent words and give new meaning to old words like naming an herbicide for a football play.

No doubt one reason for the name game is to come up with a catchy brand so people can readily remember it, particularly if it becomes an exceptionally good product in commercial agriculture.

A second reason is because people cannot easily pronounce, much less spell, the chemical names scientists dream up to identify their discoveries. Some seem to have more letters than are in the alphabet.

However, there is a new insecticide due on the market by the second quarter, 2008, that is already known by its scientific name due to early results in unusual non-destruct crop experimental trials. Vegetable growers around Santa Maria, Calif., are abuzz with the prospects of the compound reaching market soon.

The compound is Rynaxypyr, a chemistry discovered by DuPont in 2000 and due on the market next year, a record time for getting a new mode of action pesticide to the market.

Another reason the new chemistry may become better known by its formal name is that there are no fewer than six new insecticide brands from two major agchem manufacturers, including DuPont, containing the active ingredient Rynaxypyr.

Lars Swanson, DuPont Crop Protection portfolio protection manager, said at a recent field tour of vegetable EUP plots on the Central California coast that Rynaxypyr is a ryanodine receptor, which means it paralyzes pests and they quit feeding within seven minutes.

What makes the new compound widely anticipated is that it is the first available as a systemic for control of lepidopterous (worm) pests. It can be shanked in soil or applied through a drip irrigation system as well as used as a foliar treatment. It is also translaminer and effective on a wide range of worm pests in an equally broad range of crops.

There are several systemic products available for control of plant bugs and whitefly. The most commonly used of these is imidacloprid, which can also be foliar applied.

“It is the most significant product we have seen in the coast vegetable business since Success was registered when we were having problems with diamondback moth,” said Craig Sudyka, farm operations manager for BoniPak, exclusive marketers for Betteravia Farms in Santa Maria, Calif. Betteravia grows 15,000 crop acres of vegetables annually.

“Growers and PCAs are asking each other if they have seen this new product. A lot of people are talking about it,” said Sudkya, who noted whenever there is a new mode of action (MOA) pesticide coming to the market; it is significant because of the need to rotate chemistries to ward off resistance. A systemic lepidopterous control product just adds to the anticipation.

Frank Valezquez, PCA with Betteravia, applied Rynaxypyr on a one-acre EUP trial of butter lettuce. It was shanked in three inches below the seed line at planting. The plants were irrigated up with drip irrigation.

“What we really like about systemic products is that it gets us away from foliar sprays,” said Sudyka, who added it looks like Coregan, the brand name for Rynaxypyr in vegetable crops, will control pests long enough to eliminate three foliar sprays for worm pests.

Sudyka and Valezquez indicated in their trials DuPont had the potential to control a wide array of worm pests for up to five weeks.

John Macdonald, a PCA with Western Farm Service in Santa Maria, Calif., looked at the new product on spinach. He said it provided very good control for six weeks.

“It will definitely reduce the number of worm sprays we have to do” and the short pre-harvest and re-entry intervals with the new reduced risk product also make it an attractive new product.

“It looks like it will be a fantastic compound that may need some fine tuning for use as a pre-plant material. It is cost effective and is more user friendly through a drip system,” he added.

Coregan is the brand name for the Rynaxypyr product for use on fruit and leafy vegetables, brassica and cucurbits. It not only controls worm pests, but it also controls leafminer and suppresses whitefly, according to the company.

Altacor is the name of the dry formulation Rynaxypyr product for use on pome fruit, stone fruit, tree nuts, grapes and cotton. A seed treatment Rynaxypyr product is also being developed by DuPont.

Swanson said registration packets for the new product also have been submitted to the European Union, Australia and Canada. It is on a parallel track in California with the EPA registration. California growers should have it within a few weeks after it is federally registered.

Anderson noted that what has made the Experimental Use Permit process in the U.S. unusual is that the government did not require the crop to be destroyed, as is often the case with EUPs, because of the environmental safety of Rynaxypyr.

This has allowed DuPont to put out 1,300 acres of EUPs nationwide in grower fields. Trials this year included celery, cucumbers, lettuce, peppers, spinach, squash, tomatoes and watermelons in California.

“This unique non-crop destruct EUP gave us the opportunity to generate use and performance data in commercial agriculture,” noted Anderson.

A year ago Syngenta acquired exclusive worldwide licenses from DuPont to also market Rynaxypyr in mixtures with some of Syngenta's currently registered insecticide products.

As soon as Rynaxypyr is registered, Syngenta will begin marketing four new branded insecticides all containing the new DuPont-discovered chemistry and Syngenta products in combo products.

Asked about an unusual agreement that basically pits two major companies against each other in the marketplace selling the same active ingredient, Anderson said the DuPont decision to license Syngenta means more Rynaxypyr will be used.