Experience-based mediation of feeding and oviposition behaviors in the cotton bollworm: Helicoverpa armigera (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)

Abstract

Experience is well known to affect sensory-guided behaviors in many herbivorous insects. Here, we investigated the effects of natural feeding experiences of Helicoverpa armigera larvae on subsequent preferences of larval approaching and feeding, as well as the effect of host-contacting experiences of mated females on subsequent ovipositional preference. The results show that the extent of experience-induced preference, expressed by statistical analysis, depended on the plant species paired with the experienced host plant. Larval feeding preference was much easier to be induced by natural feeding experience than larval approaching preference. Naïve larvae, reared on artificial diet, exhibited clear host-ranking order as follows: tobacco ≥ cotton > tomato > hot pepper. Feeding experiences on hot pepper and tobacco could always induce positive feeding preference, while those on cotton often induced negative effect, suggesting that the direction of host plant experience-induced preference is not related to innate feeding preference. Inexperienced female adults ranked tobacco as the most preferred ovipositional host plant, and this innate preference could be masked or weakened but could not be reversed by host-contacting experience after emergence.

Transgenerational inheritance of learned preferences for novel host plant odors inBicyclus anynanabutterflies

“…This contradicts the natal habitat preference induction (NHPI) hypothesis, which proposes that adult oviposition should shift to the same plant consumed by the larvae, especially if the plant was of high quality (Davis and Stamps 2004;Moreau et al 2008;Lhomme et al 2018). These negative results, however, support those of similar experiments done in other lepidopterans (Zhang et al 2007;Janz et al 2009;Hu et al 2018). The disconnect between feeding and oviposition behaviors might be due to the encoding of the odor learning experiences by two separate groups of glomeruli in the antennal lobe (Bisch-Knaden et al 2018), or to different behavioral responses resulting from tissuespecific activation of the same set of odor receptors (Joseph and Heberlein 2012).…”

“…; Hu et al. ). The disconnect between feeding and oviposition behaviors might be due to the encoding of the odor learning experiences by two separate groups of glomeruli in the antennal lobe (Bisch‐Knaden et al.…”

Effects of mummy consumption on fitness and oviposition site selection on Harmonia axyridis

“…For predators that can exploit a range of prey that vary in quality and availability, prior feeding experiences could help them to select oviposition sites with higher prey quality for their offspring (Fréchette et al ., ). Most studies on such behavioral responses in arthropods have focused on phytophagous insects (e.g., Anderson et al ., ; Zhang & Liu, ), which are more likely to oviposit on patches where they have previous feeding experience (Michaud, ; Hu et al ., ), even when the plant was nutritionally inferior for egg production and adult survival in some species (Coyle et al ., ). There are few studies about the effect of feeding experience on the oviposition site selection of predators.…”

Leaf Consumption and Preference to Conyza sp., Conventional and Bt Soybean by Helicoverpa armigera

“…In Helicoverpa armigera were identified 60 olfactory receptors, 19 ionotropic receptors, 34 olfactory binding proteins, 18 chemosensory proteins and 2 neuron-sensory membrane proteins (Zhang et al, 2015). In addition, H. armigera previous feeding experiences can positively influence future food preference (Hu et al, 2018). The knowledge of the nutritional needs of pests contributes to understanding their population dynamics and potential for damage (Slanky Junior and Wheeler, 1992;Parra, 1991;Cohen, 2004).…”