A laboratory study was carried out to determine the effects and interactions of temperature, host deprivation and adult feeding on the longevity of the parasitoid Venturia canescens (Gravenhorst) (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae). The effect of body size was also examined. Large wasps (hind tibia length > 1.96 mm) lived significantly longer than smaller conspecifics (hind tibia length < 1.89 mm). Adults reared at 15°C lived longer regardless of whether supplied with hosts or food. Correspondingly, adults had a shorter life at 30°C. Honey-fed adults lived significantly longer than starved adults at all temperatures and irrespective of host presence, while access to hosts resulted in a decrease in longevity at all temperatures, regardless of food supply. The Weibull distribution was used to describe the age specific survival, which in V. canescens is of "Type I", as the risk of death increases with age. Despite the significant effect of host presence on survival it was less than either temperature or feeding. The interactions between feeding, host presence and temperature proved to be significant. The objective of the study was to improve the effectiveness of V. canescens as a biological control agent of stored product pests.
Endosymbiotic organisms are known to manipulate the reproductive biology of their hosts. Incomplete prevalence of endosymbiont inducing thelytokous parthenogenesis results in the coexistence of sexual and asexual individuals, and could account for the maintenance of sexual reproduction in certain populations or species. In the parasitoid Venturia canescens, arrhenotokous ("sexual") and thelytokous ("asexual") individuals occur sympatrically. We aimed to determine whether endosymbionts are implicated in the thelytoky of V. canescens. After screening females of the two reproductive modes for several reproductive parasites: bacteria (Wolbachia, Rickettsia, Bacteroidetes, Spiroplasma, Arsenophonus) and Microsporidia, we concluded that thelytoky in V. canescens is not induced by any of these parasites and confirmed its suitability as a biological model for solving the evolutionary enigma of the maintenance of sexual reproduction., Vincent Foray ... [et al.]., and Obsahuje seznam literatury