Mountain Pine Beetles Use Volatile Cues to Locate Host Limber Pine and Avoid Non-Host Great Basin Bristlecone Pine.

ABSTRACT: The tree-killing mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins) is an important disturbance agent of western North American forests and recent outbreaks have affected tens of millions of hectares of trees. Most western North American pines (Pinus spp.) are hosts and are successfully attacked by mountain pine beetles whereas a handful of pine species are not suitable hosts and are rarely attacked. How pioneering females locate host trees is not well understood, with prevailing theory involving random landings and/or visual cues. Here we show that female mountain pine beetles orient toward volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from host limber pine (Pinus flexilis James) and away from VOCs of non-host Great Basin bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva Bailey) in a Y-tube olfactometer. When pre

SUBMITTER: Gray CA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4558103 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature