Abstract
Fruit flies are phytophagous insects that are important because of the damages caused to fruits, mainly by larvae that feed on the pulp. Surveys of the diversity of these tefritids are still scarce in Brazil, especially in the Amazon region, the objective of this study was to establish the tritrophic relationship existing between species of Anastrepha, their parasitoids, and the fruits acerola (Malpighia emarginata DC.), mango (Mangifera indica L.), and guava (Psidium guajava L.) in the municipality of Brasil Novo, Pará. Freshly fallen fruits were collected weekly from January to December 2018, in three farms. Throughout the survey, 4,324 puparium were collected in guavas, 2,682 in mangoes, and 644 in acerolas. The species Anastrepha obliqua (Macquart, 1835) were identified in mango (90.3%), acerola (7.7%) and guava (2.1%), and Anastrepha striata Schiner, 1868 were identified in guava (98.8%) and acerola (1.2%). Five species of parasitoids were identified in association with A. obliqua and six species of parasitoids were identified in association with A. striata. The specie Doryctobracon areolatus (Szépligeti, 1911) was the most frequent among the species of parasitoids recorded.
Highlights
Fruit flies (Diptera: Tephritidae) are considered insect pests of great importance in world fruit production, causing significant economic losses in production and/ or leading to increased costs and management practices of orchards (Zucchi et al, 2011)
The species A. striata is an important native agricultural pest that occurs in the Amazon region and has guava as its main host (Jesus-Barros et al, 2012)
This is the first record of A. striata infesting acerola fruits in the state of Pará, and there is only one record of infestation of this fruit in the Amazon region, in Ilha de Santana, AP, by Almeida et al (2016)
Summary
Fruit flies (Diptera: Tephritidae) are considered insect pests of great importance in world fruit production, causing significant economic losses in production and/ or leading to increased costs and management practices of orchards (Zucchi et al, 2011). The economic losses caused by fruit fly infestation reach approximately US $ 1 billion per year worldwide and US$ 242 million per year in Brazil (Oliveira et al, 2013). The economically important species of Tephritidae in Brazil are separated into four genera: Anastrepha Schiner, 1968; Rhagoletis Loew, 1862; Ceratitis MacLeay, 1829; and Bactrocera Macquart, 1835. The last two are represented by a single species each, the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann, 1824), and the carambola fruit fly, Bactrocera carambolae (Drew & Hancock, 1994). The genus Anastrepha is to date represented by 121 species identified throughout the Brazilian territory and infest several native and/or exotic fruits (Zucchi & Moraes, 2008)
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