在过去30年里,专用昆虫雷达大大深化了我们对昆虫迁飞、尤其是在高达1km高度夜间迁飞的认识.早期的昆虫雷达无法开展长期监测,这种缺陷现已被一种新型的全自动雷达所克服.这种"昆虫监测雷达"(IMR)造价低廉,可自动采集并通过电话网远程传输观测数据,其ZLC制式使其能够获得高质量的迁飞个体的飞行参数从而提高目标鉴别能力.目前,在澳大利亚东部的半干旱内陆地区,即迁飞性鳞翅目害虫和澳大利亚疫蝗(Chortoicetes terminifera)的虫源区,装置了两部IMR并连续监测其迁飞活动,本文报告了这两部雷达的部分监测结果.IMR能提供构成昆虫迁飞系统所需的若干参数,即估测迁飞事件在特定季节、特定方向响应于特定环境条件和信号而发生的概率,为害虫治理机构和测报人员提供对主要迁入事件及其目标害虫可能的迁入区的预警.而且,IMR还可用于更为广泛的生态监测,特别是空中生物流量年际变化的定量监测.%Over the last three decades, special-purpose "entomological" radars have contributed much to the development of our understanding of insect migration, especially of the nocturnal migrations at altitudes of up to～1 km that are regularly undertaken by many important pest species. One of the limitations of early radar studies, the difficulty of maintaining observations over long periods, has recently been overcome by the development of automated units that operate autonomously and transmit summaries of their observations to a base laboratory over the public telephone network. These relatively low-cost Insect Monitoring Radars (IMRs) employ a novel "ZLC" configuration that allows high quality data on the migrants' flight parameters and identity to be acquired. Two IMRs are currently operating in the semi-arid inland of eastern Australia, in a region where populations of migrant moths (Lepidoptera) and Australian plague locusts Chortoicetes terminifera (Orthoptera) commonly originate, and some examples of outputs from one of these units are presented. IMRs are able to provide the data needed to characterize a migration system, i.e. to estimate the probabilities of migration events occurring in particular directions at particular seasons and in response to particular environmental conditions and cues. They also appear capable of fulfilling a "sentinel" role for pest-management organisations, alerting forecasters to major migration events and thus to the likely new locations of potential target populations. Finally, they may be suitable for a more general ecological monitoring role, perhaps especially for quantifying year-to-year variations in biological productivity.
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