The Influence of Bioecological Factors on the Development of the Bracon during Breeding under Laboratory Conditions

Abstract

In the presented work, the authors investigated the development and sex ratio of the Bracon in various environmental conditions. The greater Galleria mellonella was used as the host of the entomophage under laboratory conditions. The authors studied the influence of the temperature environment, additional imaginal nutrition and the age of the host on the sex ratio of the Bracon. Experiments with testing the effect of different temperatures in the process of infecting a host with a parasite on the sex ratio of the entomophage showed that with an increase in the temperature of parental individuals from 25 to 30°C, not only fertility increased but also the number of emerged Bracon imagines. With an increase in the temperature at which the parental pairs were kept up to 35°C, there was no increase, but, on the contrary, a slight decrease in the emerged wasps was observed. Testing of different feeding options showed that feed different in quality composition had different effects on fertility and sex ratio in the offspring. High fertility was obtained in the experiments using honey and sugar solutions for additional imaginal nutrition. The highest number of females was also obtained by feeding parental pairs with a 20% solution of honey (67.2%) and sugar syrup (64.5%).