Genetic diversity and host alternation of the egg parasitoid Ooencyrtus pityocampae between the pine processionary moth and the caper bug.

ABSTRACT: The increased use of molecular tools for species identification in recent decades revealed that each of many apparently generalist parasitoids are actually a complex of morphologically similar congeners, most of which have a rather narrow host range. Ooencyrtus pityocampae (OP), an important egg parasitoid of the pine processionary moth (PPM), is considered a generalist parasitoid. OP emerges from PPM eggs after winter hibernation, mainly in spring and early summer, long before the eggs of the next PPM generation occurs. The occurrence of OP in eggs of the variegated caper bug (CB) Stenozygum coloratum in spring and summer suggests that OP populations alternate seasonally between PPM and CB. However, the identity of OP population on CB eggs seemed uncertain; unlike OP-PPM populations, the

SUBMITTER: Samra S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4391850 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature