Within-Plant Distribution of <I>Aulacorthum solani</I> (Hemiptera: Aphididae), on Various Greenhouse Plants With Implications for Control

Abstract

Foxglove aphid, Aulacorthum solani (Kaltenbach) (Hemiptera: Aphididae), has recently undergone a status change from an occasional pest to a serious pest in greenhouses of North America and the United Kingdom. Little nonanecdotal information exists on the ecology of this insect in greenhouse crops. To help improve integrated pest management decisions for A. solani, the within-plant distribution of this pest was explored on a variety of common greenhouse plants in both the vegetative and flowering stage. This aphid generally was found on lower leaves of vegetative plants, but was found higher in the canopy on reproductive plants (on flowers, flower buds, or upper leaves). Aphid numbers were not consistently positively correlated with total leaf surface areas within plant strata across plant species. Thus, the observed differences in preferred feeding sites on vegetative versus flowering plants are possibly a response to differences in nutritional quality of the various host-plant tissues. Despite being anecdotally described as a "stem-feeding aphid," A. solani was rarely found feeding on stems at the population densities established in our tests, with the exception of racemes of scarlet sage (Salvia splendans). Although some previous reports suggested that A. solani prefers to feed on new growth of plants, our results indicate that mature leaves are preferred over growing tips and young leaves. The implications of the within-plant feeding preferences of A. solani populations with respect to both biological and chemical control are discussed.

Optimizing aphid biocontrol with the predator Aphidoletes aphidimyza, based on biology and ecology

“…Only when aphids were allowed to naturally distribute on plants did species preferences emerge. M. persicae , which strongly colonized meristematic tissues, was preferred over A. solani , which generally prefers older leaves . Such prey–species interactions with colony density and location can have important implications for control outcomes.…”

Combining lacewings and parasitoids for biological control of foxglove aphids in sweet pepper

“…; Jandricic et al. ) and two species of natural enemies. The two species of natural enemies we evaluated were the parasitoid, Aphidius ervi Haliday (Hymenoptera: Braconidae), and the predatory brown lacewing, Micromus variegatus (Fabricius) (Neuroptera: Hemerobiidae).…”

Detection of novel QTLs for foxglove aphid resistance in soybean

“…In soybean aphid research, the number of aphids per plant has been used to index plant damage grade (Xiao et al 2013). However, for foxglove aphid, the number of foxglove aphids was not highly correlated with the total plant damage grade (Jandricic et al 2014). Thus, these two damage grades, TPD and PLD, were used for further analysis.…”

“…In spite of its economic importance, research about foxglove aphid has been very limited compared to soybean aphid in terms of biology, ecology, and effective control methods. Previous reports suggested that foxglove aphid prefers fresh tissues; however, recent research indicated that mature leaves are preferred over growing tips or young leaves (Jandricic et al 2014). Raso1, a foxglove aphid resistance QTL, was isolated from the cultivar 'Adams' (Weiss 1953) and mapped on chromosome 3 (Ohnishi et al 2012).…”