Applied studies of some Southern African blowflies (Diptera: Calliphoridae) of forensic importance
- Authors: Lunt, Nicola
- Date: 2003
- Subjects: Diptera -- South Africa , Blowflies -- South Africa , Forensic entomology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSc
- Identifier: vital:5803 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1006202 , Diptera -- South Africa , Blowflies -- South Africa , Forensic entomology
- Description: Three major aspects of blowfly (Diptera: Calliphoridae) research were the focus of this study. Firstly, the phylogenetic relationships of 40 oestroid species from a variety of geographical localities were investigated using Cytochrome Oxidase b subunit I (COl) gene sequences. Maximum parsimony (MP) and Jukes-Cantor neighbor-joining (NJ) analyses both extracted a paraphyletic Calliphoridae, with the Calliphorinae-Luciliinae clade being sister to the Sarcophagidae. Short branch lengths within Chrysomya indicate a recent rapid radiation of this genus. Phormia and Protophormia either formed a sister clade to Chrysomya, or were embedded in this genus. Tree topologies were comparable between MP and NJ trees, but the positions of some genera were ambiguous. Secondly, developmental parameters and behaviour were investigated for four southern African species of forensically important blowflies viz. Chrysomya chloropyga, C. putoria, C. megacephala and Lucilia sericata, and ad hoc observations were made for Calliphora croceipalpis, Chrysomya marginalis and the predatory C. albiceps. Choice of oviposition substrate differed between species, mirroring substrate preferences in the field. Sexual dimorphism and dwarfism within a cohort complicated ageing maggots using size, but the use of developmental events (e.g. ecdysis) allowed ages to be determined unambiguously. Separate species status was supported for the previously synonymised C. chloropyga and C. putoria, by differences in maggot behaviour, larval growth rates and temperature optima. The proportion of total development time assigned to each larval instar and pupariation was variable among temperatures, but similar between congeneric species. Thirdly, since a negative linear relationship was found to occur between the developmental constant (K) and developmental zero (D₀) for both Calliphoridae and Sarcophagidae, the potential for predicting physiological parameters of unstudied taxa was investigated. Species and genera of Palaearctic origin generally had high K's and low D₀'s, and the reverse was true for the tropical taxa. It was found that both K and D₀ can be estimated for "unknown" taxa using the Felsenstein's Independent Contrasts (FIC) method of PDTree (Garland et al. 200 I), provided that branch lengths are relatively short and the phylogenetic position of the estimated taxon is unambiguous.
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The structure of ant communities and their impact on soil-pupating pests in citrus orchards in the Grahamstown area of the Eastern Cape
- Authors: Bownes, Angela
- Date: 2003
- Subjects: Ants -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Pests -- Control -- South Africa , Homoptera -- Control -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Citrus -- Diseases and pests -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSc
- Identifier: vital:5775 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1005463 , Ants -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Pests -- Control -- South Africa , Homoptera -- Control -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Citrus -- Diseases and pests -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape
- Description: Two ant species, Pheidole megacephala (Fabricius) and Anoplolepis custodiens (Smith) reach pest status in citrus orchards through precipitating outbreaks of homopterous pests. However, predacious ants, including these two ant species, play an important role in pest suppression in agroecosystems and are therefore beneficial to these systems. If A. custodiens and P. megacephala are important natural control agents in citrus, using ant bands to break the mutualism between the ants and the Homoptera as a method of ant control is preferable to poisoning. Ant communities were sampled by pitfall trapping in three experimental subunits of 2-, 4-, 15- and 30-year-old citrus orchards, in the Grahamstown area of the Eastern Cape. In one subunit in each orchard, populations of P. megacephala and A. custodiens were suppressed by poison applications. In a second subunit, trees were banded with trunk barriers so that ants were prevented from foraging in the trees and a third subunit served as the untreated control. Bait pupae of bollworm, false codling moth and fruit fly were planted in bait trays in all of the subunits to investigate predation on these citrus pests in the relative absence of predacious ants and where they were excluded from the trees. Pheidole megacephala dominated exclusively in all of the plots. Community composition did not change dramatically with increasing age of the trees, but species diversity and species abundance did. Rank-abundance curves showed that community diversity was highest in the 2-year-old plots and lowest in the 30-year-old plots. The Simpson and Shannon-Wiener diversity indices and their evenness measures indicated that diversity and equitability were highest in the poisoned subunits and lowest in the banded subunits. Principle component analysis revealed that the poisoned subunits were similar and distinct in species composition, that there was significant monthly variation in species composition and that community stability increases with an increase in orchard age. The presence of P. megacephala was significantly negatively correlated (rs = -0.293; p < 0.001) with pest pupal survival. Pupal survival was significantly higher for bollworm (p < 0.001), FCM (p < 0.001) and fruit fly (p < 0.001) in the poisoned subunits, than in the banded and control subunits. There was a general trend for survivorship to increase with an increase in the age of the trees. A significant difference (p < 0.001) was found between the months in which the trials were carried out. Pupal survival was significantly lower (p < 0.001) for FCM than for bollworm and fruit fly. In citrus orchards, ant communities are organised by ecological processes and interactions and are influenced by methods of ant control. Ant bands are preferable to poisoning as a method of ant control, so that beneficial species are left on the ground to prey on pests that pupate in the soil. Maintaining high ant species diversity in citrus orchards would be beneficial as predation on the pupae was more effective where ant species diversity was higher.
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