Abstract
Since the first reports of damage by Drosophila suzukii, the spotted-wing Drosophila (SWD), over a decade ago in Europe, widespread efforts have been made to understand both the ecology and the evolution of this insect pest, especially due to its phylogenetic proximity to one of the original model organisms, D. melanogaster. In addition, researchers have sought to find economically viable solutions for the monitoring and management of this agricultural pest, which has now swept across much of Europe, North America and Asia. In a new direction of study, we present an investigation of plant-based chemistry, where we search for natural compounds that are structurally similar to known olfactory cues from parasitoid wasps that in turn are well-described ovipositional avoidance cues for many Drosophila species. Here we test 11 plant species across two plant genera, Nepeta and Actinidia, and while we find iridoid compounds in both, only those odorants from Actinidia are noted to be detected by the insect antenna, and in addition, found to be behaviorally active. Moreover, the Actinidia extracts resulted in oviposition avoidance when they were added to fruit samples in the laboratory. Thus we propose the possible efficacy of these plants or their extracted chemistry as a novel means for establishing a cost-effective integrated pest management strategy towards the control of this pest fly.
Highlights
Since its identification in Spain and Italy in 2008 (Cini et al 2012), Drosophila suzukii, the spotted wing Drosophila (SWD), has continued to spread and remain a consistent problem throughout Europe for agricultural and commercial businesses that produce a wide variety of berry fruits or their associated products
Plant Chemistry We first sought to examine whether the plant extracts of any of the tested Nepeta or Actinidia species would include the parasitoid compounds that are known to induce oviposition avoidance in Drosophilid flies (Ebrahim et al 2015) (GC-MS; Fig. 1)
When we examined the extracts of the four different Actinidia species, we found at least traces and in some species even large amounts of several iridoids that structurally resembled all three previously described parasitoid compounds (Figs. 2, 3)
Summary
Since its identification in Spain and Italy in 2008 (Cini et al 2012), Drosophila suzukii, the spotted wing Drosophila (SWD), has continued to spread and remain a consistent problem throughout Europe for agricultural and commercial businesses that produce a wide variety of berry fruits or their associated products. J Chem Ecol (2019) 45:626–637 for research during the last decade, there is still a large gap in applicable technology for monitoring and control of this insect pest. Commercial synthetic production of compounds known to be repellent towards the Drosophila genus, such as geosmin (Stensmyr et al 2012), are prohibitively expensive to produce for large-scale usage in the field (Cloonan et al 2018; Wallingford et al 2016a, b), and their application on the fruit shortly before harvest (i.e. when D. suzukii mainly infests the berries) might have a negative impact on fruit quality (Diepenbrock et al 2017; Leach et al 2018). Economically viable strategies to combat D. suzukii still need to be identified, as most research has focused on attractive odors for monitoring or bait and kill strategies for population control (Klick et al 2019; Landolt et al 2012;)
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