Effects of Floral Scent, Color and Pollen on Foraging Decisions and Oocyte Development of Common Green Bottle Flies

Abstract

The common green bottle fly Lucilia sericata (Meigen) and other filth flies frequently visit pollen-rich composite flowers such as the Oxeye daisy, Leucanthemum vulgare Lam. In laboratory experiments with L. sericata, we investigated the effect of generic floral scent and color cues, and of Oxeye daisy-specific cues, on foraging decisions by recently eclosed flies. We also tested the effect of a floral pollen diet with 0–35% moisture content on the ability of females to mature their oocytes. Our data indicate that (1) young flies in the presence of generic floral scent respond more strongly to a uniformly yellow cue than to any other uniform color cue (green, white, black, blue, red) except for ultraviolet (UV); (2) the floral scent of Oxeye daisies enhances the attractiveness of a yellow cue; and (3) moisture-rich pollen provides nutrients that facilitate ovary maturation of flies. With evidence that L. sericata exploits floral cues during foraging, and that pollen can be an alternate protein source to animal feces and carrion, Pollen apparently plays a major role in the foraging ecology of L. sericata and possibly other filth flies. These flies, in turn, may play a significant role as pollinators, as supported by a recently published study.

Mammalian Susceptibility to a Neonicotinoid Insecticide after Fetal and Early Postnatal Exposure

“…Decreased body weight and elevated motor activity in IMI-treated male mice is consistent with the findings with nicotine 46 , and with the neonicotinoids dinotefuran and clothianidin where exposure during the prenatal and early postnatal periods also induced increased motor activity in adult mice 47 , 48 . Reduced body weight in the male IMI-treated mice is consistent with observations demonstrating that cholinergic neurons in the basal forebrain potently influence food intake and body weight.…”

New Insights Into Culturable and Unculturable Bacteria Across the Life History of Medicinal Maggots Lucilia sericata (Meigen) (Diptera: Calliphoridae)

“…Adult blowflies are regularly in contact with carrion (Pechal and Benbow, 2016), wounds on animals (Sanford et al, 2014), feces (Mann et al, 2015;Brodie et al, 2016), and even pollen-rich composite flowers (Brodie et al, 2015a). These resources are important for the courtship and mating behavior, obtaining nutrition required for oogenesis, or supporting the development of offspring (Tomberlin et al, 2017).…”

Do flower mixtures with high functional diversity enhance aphid predators in wildflower strips?

“…However, most of the predators trapped, especially ladybeetles, were trapped in the H and VL plots. Leucanthemum vulgare is typically visited by hoverfl ies, ladybeetles and lacewings (Ricci et al, 2005;Carrié et al, 2012;Wäckers & Van Rijn, 2012), because it is a rich source of nectar and pollen (Brodie et al, 2015). This resource might be of particular benefi t to ladybeetles, for which pollen is one its most nutritious nonprey food sources, enabling them to complete their development and survive when prey are scarce (Berkvens et al, 2008;Lundgren, 2009).…”