Untitled

Abstract

The Bactrocera tau complex contains fruit fly pests which damage several species of cucurbit crops. Two cryptic species, A and C, of the B. tau complex both occur on the host fruit Momordica cochinchinensis. In this study, wing geometric analysis was used to differentiate the B. tau complex on M. cochinchinensis. A total of 586 wings (297 males, 289 females) were discriminated into two groups corresponding to the reference species A and C of the B. tau complex. B. tau A and C were reclassified at higher than 96% and 99% accuracy, respectively. B. tau C had larger wings than B. tau A. Interspecific differentiation was significant due to wing size, indicating that wing shape can be used to separate the species. The B. tau C was found to be the dominant species on M. cochinchinensis. A classification tree based on Mahalanobis distances suggested that the variation within B. tau C is related to seasonal variation. The variation among seasonal populations was similar in males and females. Wing shape analysis, which can differentiate between species within cryptic complexes helping to detect variation within species, may have important applications in pest control programs.

The Effect of Cuelure on Attracting and Feeding Behavior in Zeugodacus tau (Walker) (Diptera: Tephritidae)

“…Zeugodacus tau (Walker) (Diptera: Tephritidae: Zeugodacus) was first discovered in Fujian, China, and reported by Walker in 1849 [17][18][19]. Z. tau is widely distributed in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific, including China, India, Korea, Vietnam, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Bhutan, Japan, Cambodia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and other countries [17,20,21]. In China, it is mainly found in Fujian, Jiangxi, Taiwan, Guangdong, Hainan, Zhejiang, Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, Guangxi, Hunan, Hubei, Henan, Shanxi, Gansu and other provinces.…”

Effect of larval density and substrate quality on the wing geometry of Stomoxys calcitrans L. (Diptera: Muscidae)

“…Fly wing vein networks are excellent models for statistical analysis of size and shape variation [19]. In recent years, landmark-based geometric morphometric analysis has been increasingly used to analyse insect wings to address intraspecific variation [20, 21], interspecific variation [22, 23], sexual dimorphism [24, 25], parasite detection [26, 27], laboratory strain separation [28] and phenotypic plasticity [12, 29, 30]. Geometric morphometric techniques are potent tools to assess the correlation between the size and shape of organisms and environmental variables.…”