Diapause characterisation and seasonality of Aedes japonicus japonicus (Diptera, Culicidae) in the northeast of France

Abstract

The invasive mosquito Aedes japonicus japonicus (Theobald, 1901) settled in 2013 in the Alsace region, in the northeast of France. In this temperate area, some mosquito species use diapause to survive cold winter temperatures and thereby foster settlement and dispersal. This study reports diapause and its seasonality in a field population of Ae. japonicus in the northeast of France. For two years, eggs were collected from May to the beginning of November. They were most abundant in summer and became sparse in late October. Diapause eggs were determined by the presence of a fully developed embryo in unhatched eggs after repeated immersions. Our study showed effective diapause of Ae. japonicus in this part of France. At the start of the egg-laying period (week 20), we found up to 10% of eggs under diapause, and this rate reached 100% in October. The 50% cut-off of diapause incidence was determined by the end of summer, leading to an average calculated maternal critical photoperiod of 13 h 23 min. Interestingly, diapause was shown to occur in part of the eggs even at the earliest period of the two seasons, i.e. in May of each year. Even though we observed that the size of eggs was positively correlated with diapause incidence, morphology cannot be used as the unique predictive indicator of diapause status due to overlapping measurements between diapausing and non-diapausing eggs. This study provides new knowledge on diapause characterisation and invasive traits of Ae. japonicus.