Plant Protection Quarterly Vol.20(1) 2005 33 industry as S. aurantii could have a major impact on the cost of producing high Australian Scirtothrips aurantii Faure (Thysanoptera: quality, unblemished fruit and major implications for export markets. However, Thripidae) only survived on mother-of-millions the behaviour displayed by S. aurantii in (Bryophyllum delagoense) in a no-choice trial Australia was different from its South African counterpart, as it was only found A.G. MannersA and K. DhileepanB on plants from the family Crassulaceae A CRC for Australian Weed Management, School of Integrative Biology, The (Table 1) and was most often found on B. delagoense. Scirtothrips aurantii was not University of Queensland (UQ), Queensland 4072, Australia. found on any of the ‘known’ host plants Email
[email protected] that were in close proximity to infested B Alan Fletcher Research Station, Queensland Department of Natural B. delagoense, e.g. mango and peach. Resources and Mines (QDNRM), 27 Magazine Street, Sherwood, Queensland Therefore we conducted a trial in the field 4075, Australia. on potted plants in order to start testing if S. aurantii would survive on citrus and mango in Australia. It should be noted that at the time of this trial we were unable Summary to conduct experiments under controlled The South African citrus thrips Scir- Laurence Mound (CSIRO) positively conditions, as quarantine restrictions did tothrips aurantii has recently been dis- identified S. aurantii collected by Andrew not allow for transport of the insect. covered in Australia for the first time, Manners and Céline Clech-Goods (QDN- primarily on Bryophyllum delagoense, RM) from Bryophyllum delagoense (Eckl.