MORPHO-ECOLOGICAL STUDY OF REPRODUCTION AND EARLY ONTOGENESIS OF PHYTOSEIID MITES (ACARI: PHYTOSEIIDAE)

About authors:

All-Russian Institute of Plant Protection (VIZR), St. Petersburg, Russia;
Institute of Applied Entomology (INAPPEN), St. Petersburg, Russia

All-Russian Institute of Plant Protection (VIZR), St. Petersburg, Russia

X-BIO Institute, University of Tyumen, Tyumen, Russia

X-BIO Institute, University of Tyumen, Tyumen, Russia

X-BIO Institute, Tyumen State University, Tyumen, Russia;
Department of Plant Protection, Yazd Branch, Islamic Azad University, Yazd, Iran;
Department of Plant Protection, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Acknowledgments:

Abstract:

This study has experimentally examined the relative offspring size, the larval feeding behavior and the protonymph resistance to food stress in phytoseiid mites with different food specializations. No correlation was found between egg size and female body size; however, relative egg size varied significantly among species. Among the six examined species, Phytoseiulus persimilis has produced the largest offspring. At the same time, its protonymphs survived for a shorter period in the absence of food, compared with the species producing smaller eggs. For instance, Neoseiulus neoagrestis protonymphs survived up to 6.5 days without food, whereas those of P. persimilis survived only for about 3.8 days under similar conditions. In N. neoagrestis, no differences were observed in the development rates between the non-feeding and feeding larvae, indicating that hunting and feeding are facultative during this stage. Moreover, larvae kept in groups developed faster than those kept individually. This acceleration of development may serve as a strategy to avoid cannibalism, which occurred at the rates of 15–25% in this study and was unaffected by the presence or absence of food. These findings suggest that the tolerance to food stress may represent a valuable screening criterion for selecting new phytoseiid species for biocontrol applications.

DOI: 10.21684/0132-8077-2026-34-1-97-106

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