Post-Mating Interactions and Their Effects on Fitness of Female and Male Echinothrips americanus (Thysanoptera: Thripidae), a New Insect Pest in China

Xiao-Wei Li, Hong-Xue Jiang, Xiao-Chen Zhang, Anthony M Shelton and Ji-Nian Feng

PLOS ONE, 2014, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Post-mating, sexual interactions of opposite sexes differ considerably in different organisms. Post-mating interactions such as re-mating behavior and male harassment can affect the fitness of both sexes. Echinothrips americanus is a new insect pest in Mainland China, and little is known about its post-mating interactions. In this study, we observed re-mating frequency and male harassment frequency and their effects on fitness parameters and offspring sex ratios of E. americanus females. Furthermore, we tested the impact of mating and post-mating interactions on fitness parameters of males. Our results revealed that the re-mating frequency in female adults was extremely low during a 30-day period. However, post-mating interactions between females and males, consisting mainly of male harassment and female resistance, did occur and significantly reduced female longevity and fecundity. Interestingly, increased access to males did not affect the ratio of female offspring. For males, mating dramatically reduced their longevity. However, post-mating interactions with females had no effects on the longevity of mated males. These results enrich our basic knowledge about female and male mating and post-mating behaviors in this species and provide important information about factors that may influence population regulation of this important pest species.

Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0087725 (text/html)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id= ... 87725&type=printable (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:plo:pone00:0087725

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0087725

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in PLOS ONE from Public Library of Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by plosone ().