Abstract
Amblydromalus limonicus is a polyphagous phytoseiid predator used for the biological control of thrips and whiteflies in greenhouse crops. Besides various prey species, A. limonicus can also feed on pollen of different plants. Cattail pollen has been previously shown to be suitable for the development and reproduction of A. limonicus. Hence, it could sustain its populations in periods of prey scarcity. In the present study, we hypothesized that pollen provisioning may benefit A. limonicus in mixed diets with prey of low quality, such as spider mites and thus, positively impact ecosystem services provided by this predator. For this, the performance and predation efficiency of A. limonicus against spider mites was assessed in the presence or absence of pollen. Our results show that pollen significantly shortens the developmental time and increases the survival and oviposition of the predator when mixed with spider mites, although it negatively affects its predation rate. Nevertheless, pollen enhances the maintenance of juvenile predators on the leaf by substantially decreasing their dispersal rate in the mixed diet with spider mites. In addition, the intrinsic rate of population increase (rm) of A. limonicus feeding with spider mites increased with the addition of pollen suggesting an increase in its population. Cattail pollen as supplementary food may thus expand the prey species range that A. limonicus could exploit. It can also enhance ecosystem services provided against other pests (thrips and whiteflies) by positively affecting the increase of A. limonicus population.
Highlights
The success of biological control, an important ecosystem service provided by natural enemies is, in many circumstances, dependent on the availability, or exogenous application of alternative/supplementary foods
Generalist phytoseiid predators are capable of exploiting both animal and plant food (McMurtry and Croft, 1997; McMurtry et al, 2013) but to which extent plant food provisioning could affect the performance of phytoseiids that have access to prey has been scarcely addressed so far (e.g., Nomikou et al, 2002; van Rijn et al, 2002; Messelink et al, 2010; Pappas et al, 2013)
Our limited knowledge on mixed diet effects on phytoseiid performance is restricted to the preferred prey of each particular predator species, and only barely studied in combination with prey species of lower suitability [e.g., spider mites for P. finitimus in Pappas et al, 2013]
Summary
The success of biological control, an important ecosystem service provided by natural enemies is, in many circumstances, dependent on the availability, or exogenous application of alternative/supplementary foods. Plant-based foods such as nectar and pollen constitute important components of omnivorous diets of many polyphagous predators. They can function as supplemental foods in the presence of prey and as alternative foods when prey is scarce or not available in the crop (Coll and Guershon, 2002; Wäckers, 2005; Messelink et al, 2014). Many omnivorous polyphagous predators rely heavily for population maintenance or build-up on the presence of plant food. These may be already available in the crop or, in the case of augmentative biological control, they are provided intentionally to enhance predator populations. Depending on the extent of their reliance of feeding on plant (pollen) and/or animal
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