Mating behavior and vibrational mimicry in the glassy-winged sharpshooter, Homalodisca vitripennis

Vibrational mating disruption of Empoasca vitis by natural or artificial disturbance noises

“…A rival male intercepting a conspecific signal can employ different strategies to disrupt courtship and increase his chances of mating: alternation of male calls, production of rivalry signals that mask the female reply, silently approaching the duetting female and assuming the mating role of the first male (i.e. satellite behavior), and mimicry of the female signals . In applied biotremology, the most studied strategy is the use of masking signals to disrupt the pair formation process.…”

“…Ever since, basic researchers and the chemical industry have worked, often together, to improve this method that is still far from its full application potential . The idea of developing a vibrational mating disruption method is relatively new, but because many pests use substrate‐borne vibrations to communicate, the interest in its applicability is rapidly growing . The approach to vibrational mating disruption varies with the behavior of the target species; among these, naturally occurring disturbance noises emitted by rival males have been successfully used to mask and interrupt the pair formation process.…”

“…This was first tested on the psyllid, Diaphorina citri Kuwayama, and it is based on a smart system that detects and identifies male calls and responds with timely and reliable synthetic replies . Recently, two alternative control strategies have been proposed for species in which the female spontaneously emits signals, such as the stink bug Halyomorpha halys (Stål) and the leafhopper Homalodisca vitripennis (Germar) . In these cases, the female signal can attract males or interfere with mating communication by looping the playback into the substrate, respectively …”

Mating disruption of Homalodisca vitripennis (Germar) (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae) by playback of vibrational signals in vineyard trellis

“…Briefly, vibrational signals produced by the female were recorded in the laboratory using the laser Doppler vibrometry methods described below. The signals (FS1) had clear harmonic structures and an increasing fundamental frequency (ff) with a constant positive slope increase between the beginning and end of the ff, which are typical of a FS1 . These signals had been used previously in mating disruption trials conducted in the laboratory, but had never been tested under the field conditions described here.…”

“…In previous research on the mating behavior of GWSS, vibrational communication signals were identified and described, and candidate disruptive signals (natural and synthetic) were designed and tested in the laboratory via playback to individuals and male–female pairs on small plants. Data from these studies support application of vibrational mating disruption as a novel method to control GWSS populations, but the properties and efficacy of vibrational signals during transmission through a more complex structural substrate such as wires used in vineyard trellis have not been determined.…”