es y mit en or t tion and eda oduc ung Nguy T oseiid pr Duc or the pr yt oods f t of ph emen titious f tion enhanc tificial and fac Ar popula Artificial and factitious foods for the production and Duc Tung Nguyen population enhancement of phytoseiid predatory mites 2015 ISBN 978-90-5989-764-9 To my family Promoter: Prof. dr. ir. Patrick De Clercq Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium Chair of the examination committee: Prof. dr. ir. Geert Haesaert Department of Applied Biosciences Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium Members of the examination committee: Prof. dr. Gilbert Van Stappen Department of Animal Production Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium Prof. dr. ir. Luc Tirry Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium Prof. dr. ir. Stefaan De Smet Department of Animal Production Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium Prof. dr. Felix Wäckers Lancaster Environment Centre University of Lancaster, United Kingdom Prof. dr. Nguyen Van Dinh Department of Entomology Faculty of Agronomy Vietnam National University of Agriculture, Vietnam Dean: Prof. dr. ir. Guido Van Huylenbroeck Rector: Prof. dr. Anne De Paepe Artificial and factitious foods for the production and population enhancement of phytoseiid predatory mites by Duc Tung Nguyen Thesis submitted in the fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor (PhD) in Applied Biological Sciences Dutch translation: Artificiële en onnatuurlijke voedselbronnen voor de productie en de populatie-ondersteuning van roofmijten uit de familie Phytoseiidae Please refer to this work as follows: Nguyen, D.T. 2015. Artificial and factitious foods for the production and population enhancement of phytoseiid predatory mites. PhD Thesis, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium Frontcover: A female Amblyseius swirskii Backcover: Top: dry decapsulated cysts of A. franciscana. Middle left: prepupae of black soldier fly, Hermetia illucens. Middle right: Ephestia kuehniella eggs. Bottom: pupae of Chinese oak silkworm Antheraea pernyi ISBN-number: 978-90-5989-764-9 The research was conducted at the Laboratory of Agrozoology, Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium. The author and promoter give the permission to use this study for consultation and to copy parts of it for personal use only. Every other use is subject to copyright laws. Permission to reproduce any material should be obtained from the author. Acknowledgement Undertaking this PhD has been a truly life-changing experience for me and it would not have been obtained without the support and guidance that I received from many people. So many people I would like to acknowledge, however, it might not be simple to express it enough. First of all, I would like to thank my promoter, Prof. dr. ir. Patrick De Clercq for his brilliant supervision. He gave me a valuable opportunity to do my PhD at the Laboratory of Agrozoology, Ghent University. For me, he is not only an excellent advisor but also a respected colleague. He is always very kind to discuss, encourage and listen to my ideas. I much appreciate his time spent to read, correct and comment on my manuscripts, especially during his busy time and even his holiday period to help finish my writing on time. I would like to thank him again for his support and encouragement. I sincerely want to thank the members of the examination committee: Prof. dr. ir. Geert Haesaert, Prof. dr. Gilbert Van Stappen, Prof. dr. ir. Luc Tirry, Prof. dr. ir. Stefaan De Smet, Prof. dr. Felix Wäckers and Prof. dr. Nguyen Van Dinh for their thorough reading of my manuscript and their useful comments and suggestions that undoubtedly helped to improve my thesis further. I would like to give special thanks to Dominiek Vangansbeke who accompanied me for the past four years. It is hard for me to find enough words to express my gratitude to him for so much help and his contributions to this thesis. I feel so lucky to have him as a colleague in my PhD project and I enjoyed very much our discussion about the research, culture, food and whatever. I also thank Jochem Bonte for his guidance in statistical analysis. I sincerely thank Lü Xin and Thomas Spranghers for sharing the ideas about the Chinese oak silkworm and black soldier fly hemolymph and providing the materials for my experiments. I would like to acknowledge the students Simon Craeye and Vincent Bouguet for their contributions to this dissertation. I wish you all success in your research and in your careers. I enjoyed very much working in the office which I shared with Joachim Moens and Annelies Scholaert and later with Veerle Van Damme and Xie Jia Qin. I am deeply grateful for their warm friendship and help. I would like to express my sincere thanks to Leen Dierick, Bjorn Vandekerkhove, Rik Van Caenegem and Didier Van de Velde for their help with administrative and other issues. I would like to extend my thanks to other colleagues and friends in the Laboratory of Agrozoology: Thijs Machtelinckx, Sara Maes, Brecht Ingels, Veronic De Puysseleyr, Jisheng Liu, Yu Na, and more. I would like to thank Koppert B.V., Biobest N.V., the Artemia Reference Center (ARC) of Ghent University and the Guangdong Entomological Institute, China for support and for providing materials used in this research. I gratefully acknowledge the funding received towards my PhD from the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET, project 322). I would like to express my deep appreciation to all of my colleagues at the Entomology Department, Vietnam National University of Agriculture for their encouragement and support. Especially, I am very thankful to Prof. Nguyen Van Dinh for all his help, advice, and encouragement. I would like to thank all my Vietnamese friends in Ghent, especially to Anh Ngoc, Minh Phuong, Thu Giang, Thanh Que for their help, support and understanding, especially during the period of high pressure from work. I am deeply thankful to my family, specifically, my parents, my mother-in-law, and my sisters, who have supported and encouraged me throughout my life. This last word of acknowledgment I have saved for my dear wife Thanh Ngoc, my beloved daughter Ngoc Anh and son Duc Anh for their love, sacrifice and endless support. Without the encouragements from them, I don’t think I could have finished my PhD study. Nguyen Duc Tung, January 2015 Table of Contents List of abbreviations .................................................................................................. iv Chapter 1 Introduction, objectives and thesis outline ............................................ 1 1.1 General introduction .......................................................................................... 2 1.2 Objectives of the study ........................................................................................ 2 1.3 Thesis outline ...................................................................................................... 3 Chapter 2 Bio-ecology, biological control potential and rearing of Amblyseius swirskii: a literature review ........................................................................................ 5 2.1 General biology of the Phytoseiidae (Acari) ...................................................... 6 2.2 Amblyseius swirskii ........................................................................................... 8 2.2.1 Classification ............................................................................................... 8 2.2.2 Distribution .................................................................................................. 8 2.2.3 Morphology and identification .................................................................... 9 2.2.3.1 Eggs ...................................................................................................... 9 2.2.3.2 Larvae and nymphs .............................................................................. 9 2.2.3.3 Adult ................................................................................................... 10 2.2.4 Bio-ecology ............................................................................................... 13 2.2.4.1 Development ...................................................................................... 13 2.2.4.2 Reproduction ...................................................................................... 17 2.2.4.3 Prey spectrum and feeding behaviour ................................................ 22 2.2.5 Practical application of phytoseiid mites in biological control ................. 25 2.2.5.1 Target pests and crops ........................................................................ 25 2.2.5.2 Commercial use and release strategies ............................................... 28 2.3 Rearing of natural enemies .............................................................................. 29 2.3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................... 29 2.3.2 Factitious foods ......................................................................................... 30 2.3.3 Artificial diets ............................................................................................ 33 2.3.3.1 Types of artificial diets ....................................................................... 33 2.3.3.2 Function of diet components