The Nutritional Requirements of the Firebrat, Thermobia Domestica (Packard)
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University of Massachusetts Amherst ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014 1949 The nutritional requirements of the firebrat, Thermobia domestica (Packard). William James Wall University of Massachusetts Amherst Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/theses Wall, William James, "The nutritional requirements of the firebrat, Thermobia domestica (Packard)." (1949). Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014. 2819. Retrieved from https://scholarworks.umass.edu/theses/2819 This thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014 by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact [email protected]. I UMASS/AMHERST i 31EDbb DE3D 3^6=1 4 THE NUTRITIONAL REQUIREMENTS OF THE FIREBRAT, TBERMOBIA DOMESTICA (PACKARD) «nwwwB^wiMKi^SMiSiSKang»Ti .'ALL, Jr, -1949 THE NUTRITIONAL REQUIREMENTS OF THE FIREBRAT, THERHOBIA DQEESTICA (PACKARD) ' William J. Wall Jr. t cl iin uk(Vi l>lt'iV or i w Thesis Submitted for the Degree of Master of Science University of Massachusetts Amherst May, 1949 TABLE OF CONTENTS Pag© INTRODUCTION... 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 3 Household Insects. 4 Social Insects . 7 Insects Affecting Man and Domestic Animals . 8 Insects Attacking Grain and Grain Products ..... 11 Insects Feeding on Fruits. .. 14 Miscellaneous Insects. ............... 16 Summary .. 16 PROCEDURE. 18 PRELIMINARY SXPERBUSNTS. 21 Humidity. 21 Food. 21 Discussion of Experiments. 24 Summary of Preliminary Experiments. 29 EXPERIMENTS. 31 Discussion of Experiments. 32 CONCLUSIONS. 43 SUMMARY OF KXPERB5ENTS. 46 » LITERATURE. 47 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS INTRODUCTION The firebrat, Thermobla domestloa (Paokard), is a small rapidly moving Thysanuran insect. The order Thy- sanura belongs to the Apterygota, a group of primitive in¬ sects having no winged ancestors. The adult inseot is long, slender and wingless, attaining an average body length of 3-10 mm. and maximum length of approximately 12 mm. There are 3 long filiform appendages approximately 3-9 mm. in length at the oaudal end of the body. A pair of styll is found on the ventral sternites of the 7th, 3th and 9th abdominal segments. The antennae are very long and many Jointed, while the mouth parts are formed for chewing. The body is covered with scales whioh have dusky markings on the upper surf&oe, giving the Inseot a brown-banded appearance. In so far as is known, this species is confined en¬ tirely to heated habitations of man, particularly in warm moist areas around steampipes and boilers. When present in large numbers, these pests are of considerable economic importance, attacking starchy products and protein mater¬ ials such as glue (Spencer 1930). Most damage is done by their attacks upon wall paper, card files, book bindings, starohed olothing and stocks of paper on which glue or paste has been used as sizing. 2 This study is an attempt to determine some of the basic nutritional requirements of the firebrat, Thermobia domeatlca (Packard). REVIEW OF LITERATURE Since the nutritional work on Insects to date has been done on a relatively few species, it is exceedingly difficult to arrange this information for analysis. Many of the work¬ ers experimenting in this field do not give the basic con¬ stituents of the diets used - which limits the value of the data obtained. This is particularly true in oases where the foods employed have overlapped in respect to the organic and inorganic elements. The possibility of microorganisms in the insect gut elaborating certain dietary constituents has been mentioned by many writers, but the fact remains however, that little is known about this subjeot, further complicating the available knowledge. Therefore, to facilitate the hand¬ ling of the information, the writer has placed the insects into groups with similar feeding or social habits as follows: A. Household Inseots B. Social Insects C. Inseots Affecting Man and Domestic Animals D. Inseots Attacking Grain and Grain Products E. Insect8 Feeding on Fruits F. Miscellaneous Insects Household Insects In early experiments by Wollman (1926) on the cockroach, Blatella germanlca (L.), it was noted that nympha fed on ster¬ ilized food, developed normally and produced a continuous ser¬ ies of generations for five years. This led the author to be¬ lieve that the nymphs did not need vitamins. This opinion was reversed by Melampy (1937) who claimed that vitamin B-complex of dried yeast is required by B. germanloa. He further stated that the essential part of this vitamin is heat stable. Among the foods used, ground whole wheat with meat products gave suc¬ cessful results. MoCay (1938) agrees with Melampy in that cer¬ tain essential faotors found in yeast are necessary for normal development of the German cockroach. These factors are partial¬ ly soluble in water and in lipid solvents. MoCay also claimed that no demonstrable need could be found for the fat-soluble vitamins A and 0. Bowers and MoCay (1940) found no necessity for the vitamin A nor was any evidence found that it could be synthesized by Blatella. This work on vitamins was furthered by Gier (1947)• He claimed that intestinal bacteria of Perl- planets americana L. may produce enough proteins or growth promoting vitamins from foods to Keep the insects alive. Crowell and MoCay (1937) successfully reared the webbing clothes moth, Tlneola biselllella (Hummel) on a diet of casein, lactalbumln, Harris B concentrate and fish meal ash. The value 5 of the latter was considered questionable. Purified oasein alone was considered unsatisfactory for the larvae, but lac- talbumin supplemented this satisfactorily. Vitamin B-complex was considered essential for development while the fat solu¬ ble vitamins were not. No definite need for fat could be found by these workers. Slow growth was obtained by Moore (1943) with two spe¬ cies or varieties of the black carpet beetle, Attagenus. on a synthetic medium of vitamin free casein, starch, minerals, extracted fish meal, benzene extract of liver, glycerol, choline, nicotinic sold, thiamin, riboflavin, pyridoxin and pantothenic acid. If any of the latter five of the B-oomplex group was omitted, growth oeased and did not continue again until the missing vitamin was supplied. Whittemore (1938) working with Thermobia domestioa (Packard) claims that otsrbohydrate in some form is necessary for development. He considered that starch was not the form since amylolitlo anzymes were apparently absent. Fats were considered necessary for development, proteins were essential and salts served as a supplement to and Inadequate diet. Con¬ cerning the vitamins, he concluded that vitamin C is unneces¬ sary, one or more fractions of B-complex are essential and A is doubtful. Remington (1948) successfully reared several generations of T. domestica on whole wheat flour, with no re- - 6 - tardation of maturation and reproduction. Powdered yeast (vitamin B-complex) placed in the culture was not eaten by the insects. However, whole wheat flour does contain some elements of B-complex vitamins. From this evidence it may be assumed that vitamin B- complex or certain of its components are necessary for the development of various species of cockroaohes. Ho need for vitamins A or D is shown. However, the possibility of in¬ testinal bacteria elaborating vitamins was not excluded. A ■ > r’ * necessity is also indicated for carbohydrates and proteins. The webbing clothes moth needs elements of proteins and vi¬ tamin B-complex but not the fat soluble vitamins. The black carpet beetle must have elements of fats, oarbohydrates, proteins, minerals and especially vitamin B-complex to devel- op. Thermobla domestlea must have carbohydrates, proteins and vitamin B-complex in some form. Vitamins C and A are probably not essential, while the need of salts and fats are doubtful• In general it may be stated that for this group of in¬ sects, the evidence overwhelmingly favors the necessity of the B-complex group in addition to carbohydrate and proteins as essential for growth. Social Insects Phillips (1927) experimenting with simple and complex carbohydrates utilized by adult honeybees, concluded that the following could be used: glucose, levulose, 3ucrose, treha¬ lose, maltose, and melezltose. Galaotose, mannose, lactose, raffinose, dextrin, starch and inulin gave negative results. Meanwhile Bertholf (1927) found that the larvae of honeybees differ from the adults in their ability to use dextrin, galao¬ tose and lactose and they, like the adult, can metabolize two rare sugars, melezltose and trehalose. Searching for food to replace pollen, Haydak (1933) reared the larvae on a series of diets including dried yeast, fresh whole milk, skim milk powder, whole egg, egg yolk and egg white. The broods of these colonies however, were quite variable in number. The best results were obtained with dried yeast and the poorest with egg white. Haydak (1936) substituted meat scraps and commercial casein mixtures with good results. But, cottonseed meal, ground dried blood, whole oats and whole wheat flour gave poorer development. He was able to keep adults alive for a considerable period of time on carbohydrates alone, but for development, the elements found in pollen are essen¬ tial. Cook and Scott (1933) were able to rear termites, Termopals anguat1oollls Hagen on a diet consisting of sugar, proteins, salts, vitamins A, B, P, and G. All these sub- stances were believed necessary for normal development. The termites were able to exist for considerable periods on pure oellulose, but for normal growth, salts, sulfur, phosphorous and organic nitrogen must be available. Smith (1945) working with ants of the genus Camponotus. showed that imagines of oolonies fed on vitamin free food were smaller than those supplied with vitamins. His conclu¬ sions were that the bacterial flora found in the gut of nurse ants and their larvae elaborate enough vitamins to permit somewhat abnormal larval development to prooeed. From this limited evidence, it may be concluded that honeybees are able to utilize a wide variety of simple and complex sugars.