Borges da Silva, E., Franco, J.C., Campos, L., Branco, M., & Mendel, Z. 2008 The role of female age and density, male experience and light on mealybug mating success.. Proceedings of the XI International Symposium on Scale Insect Studies, Oeiras, Portugal, 24-27 September 2007. ISA Press Lisbon, Portugal 322 pp.

Notes: The influence of several factors on the mating success of the citrus mealybug Planococcus citri (Risso) (Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae) was investigated. One-hour-period bioassays were carried out in Petri dish arenas under laboratory conditions (22°C, 50% RH). Testing pairs of mature virgin males and virgin females of one of three ages (5, 26 and 33 days after eclosion) suggest that female age may negatively affect the mating success of the mealybug. The percentages of both tentative copulation (=TC) (viz., no offspring production) and effective mating (=EM) (viz., successful offspring production) decreased with increasing female age: 60-38% for TC and 47-0% for EM. The effect of female density was studied by exposing an increasing number (1, 2, 4, 8 and 16) of virgin females (5 days after eclosion) to a mature virgin male. A Significant linear relationship was found between female density and the percentages of both TC (R2= 0.919) and EM (R2= 0.917). The influence of male experience was tested by comparing the performance of virgin and experienced (with one previous effective mating event) males. Male sexual experience did not affect male performance: 60% and 52% for TC and 46% and 40% for EM, for virgin and experienced males respectively. The effect of the photophase period was studied by exposing one virgin male to one young virgin female in two periods of the day (morning 8:00-13:00 and afternoon 14:00- 17:00). The level of both TC and EM were not affected by the light timing, 60% and 60% for TC and 46% and 44% for EM, in morning and the afternoon hours, respectively. The effect of pre-exposure of males to light was also tested, using mealybug males that had been exposed to light for 4 hours prior to the experiment. The pre-exposure decreased the percentage of TC by 45% and EM by 66% respectively.