Behavioral Response of Leptoglossus zonatus (Heteroptera: Coreidae) to Stimuli Based on Colors and its Aggregation Pheromone

Abstract

The leaf-footed bug Leptoglossus zonatus (Dallas) (Heteroptera: Coreidae) is an important pest in the Americas. However, no preference of colors, sexual behavior nor aggregation pheromone has been reported, which can be used for detection, monitoring, and control purposes. In the laboratory we tested the attractiveness of white, violet, blue, green, yellow, and orange color to nymphs and adults (mated and unmated) and found that most adults and nymphs were attracted to and remained longer on blue and green colored cards than the other colors tested. We found that couples may remain in copula ≈185 min and mate ≈20 times in a 60 d period with a similar number of matings during the scotophase and the photophase. Sexual behavior consists of six patterns: grooming, abdomen movement, antenna movement, antennation, mounting, and mating. In a Y-tube olfactometer, 80 and 62.5% of the adults tested were attracted to a hexane-extract of the volatiles released by 40 males and 40 females, respectively. This is the first report of the biological evidence of an aggregation pheromone in this bug.