The selective toxicity of six kinds of insecticides, including imidacloprid, imidacloprid+synergist (SV1), fenvalerate, endosulfan, methomyl and dimethoate, between the green peach aphid (Myzus persicae Sulzer) and two species of ladybirds (Coccinella septempunctata Linnaeus and Propylaea japonica Thunbery), was investigated in the laboratory. The results showed that both imidacloprid WP and imidacloprid+synergist (SV1) EC possessed the highest toxicity to the aphids. Between C. septempunctata and M. persicae and between P. japonica and M. persicae, the selective toxicity ratios (STRs) of imidacloprid WP, imidacloprid+ synergist (SV1) EC and endosulfan EC were 37.6 and 13.0, 9.84 and 7.75, 54.0 and 7.28 respectively. All of them showed rather high selective toxicity. The STRs of fenvalerate EC, dimethoate EC and methomyl EC were all very low, ranging from 0.02 to 0.21, indicating their low degree of safety to the two species of ladybirds. The results demonstrated that imidacloprid WP and imidacloprid+SV1 EC not only had rather high toxicity to the aphids, but also reduced strikingly the reproduction rate and fecundity of the survival aphids. Insecticides can induce the relative fitness of insects decrease. Among the six insecticides tested with M. persicae, the following were insecticides and the order of induction was: imidacloprid + SV1> imidacloprid > endosulfan > methomyl > fenvalerate > dimethoate.
