Developmental and Reproductive Fitness of Orius laevigatus (Hemiptera: Anthocoridae) Reared on Factitious and Artificial Diets

Influence of Male Age and Diet on Reproductive Potential of Orius laevigatus (Hemiptera: Anthocoridae)

“…The age and diet of the males had no effect on hatching rate of the eggs, indicating that these factors have no inßuence on the quality of sperm. These Þndings are in line with De Clercq et al (2005) and Bonte and De Clercq (2008) who reported that the diet offered to O. laevigatus pairs did not affect hatching rate of deposited eggs.…”

“…The artiÞcial diet was a meridic diet developed for O. laevigatus by Arijs and De Clercq (2002). This diet contained 3 g of casein, 2.5 g of casein hydrolysate, 2 g of soy hydrolysate, 3 g of lactalbumin, 30 g of fresh henÕs egg yolk, 3 g of soy oil, 1 g of peanut oil, 1 g of dextrose, 0.5 g of WessonÕs salt mix, 53.9 g of water, 0.06 g of a vitamin mix based on the vitamin composition of bovine liver (weight percentages: 25.4% nicotinic acid, 4.9% riboßavin, 0.5% thiamine, 1.5% vitamin B 6 , 12.4% Ca-pantothenate, 1% folic acid, 0.1% biotin, and 54.2% vitamin C), and 1 mg of vitamin E. The diet was kept at 4ЊC for a maximum of 7 d and encapsulated using an encapsulation device (USDAÐARS, Gainesville, FL) into hemispherical domes (70 l) consisting of stretched ParaÞlm M as described by Bonte and De Clercq (2008). The artiÞcial diet was replaced daily.…”

“…Female adults were weighed on a Sartorius Genius ME215P balance (Sartorius, Goettingen, Germany) upon adult emergence (Ͻ24 h old). After 8 d all females were dissected according to the method described by Bonte and De Clercq (2008) and oocytes were scored as a prediction of the reproductive capacity of the predator. All oocytes within the ovaries and oviducts were scored as follows: 1, late vitellogenic to mature oocyte; 0.5, early to mid vitellogenic oocyte, i.e., having minimum half the size of a mature oocyte; 0.25, previtellogenic oocyte, i.e., smaller than half the size of a mature oocyte; and 0, no observable oocyte.…”

“…Commercial mass production of this predator is generally done using eggs of the Mediterranean ßour moth, Anagasta kuehniella (Zeller), as food and plant materials such as bean pods as oviposition substrates. Several studies have focused on the development of more cost-effective, factitious foods and artiÞcial diets for this anthocorid predator (Arijs and De Clercq 2004, De Clercq et al 2005, Bonte and De Clercq 2008. The current study aimed at evaluating the inßuence of diet and age of male mates on the reproductive Þtness of O. laevigatus females.…”

Approaches to conserving natural enemy populations in greenhouse crops: current methods and future prospects

“…Sterilized eggs of the flour moth Ephestia kuehniella Zeller and decapsulated cysts of the brine shrimp Artemia franciscana Kellogg are two very suitable food sources for both generalist predatory bugs Bonte and de Clercq 2008) and predatory mites ( Vangansbeke et al 2014). These two food sources are now increasingly being used to boost densities of the predatory bug M. pygmaeus in tomato and sweet pepper crops (Calvo et al 2012;van Holstein-Saj and Messelink 2014).…”