Oxyops vitiosa

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Oxyops vitiosa
Melaleuca leaf weevil.jpg
Melaleuca leaf weevil
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Animalia
Phylum:
Arthropoda
Class:
Insecta
Order:
Coleoptera
Superfamily:
Curculionoidea
Family:
Curculionidae
Subfamily:
Curculioninae
Tribe:
Gonipterini
Genus:
Oxyops
Species:
O. vitiosa
Binomial name
Oxyops vitiosa
Pascoe, 1870

Oxyops vitiosa is a species of weevil in the family Curculionidae. Common names include the melaleuca leaf weevil and the melaleuca snout beetle. It feeds on the leaves and shoots of the broad-leaved paper bark tree, Melaleuca quinquenervia, which is endemic to Australia where it grows on seasonally inundated plains and swampland, and was introduced into Florida in order to help drain flooded portions of the Everglades. [1]

Contents

Life cycle

Adult weevils are gray and six to nine millimetres long, the males being slightly smaller than the females. They are usually found on the leaves and twigs of saplings or the new growth of larger melaleuca trees but are inconspicuous and their presence is most noticeable from the holes they chew in the buds, leaves and stems. [2]

After mating, the females lays eggs singly or in small groups on the tips of young leaves or sometimes on more mature leaves and new plant growth. The eggs are yellow and one millimetre long when laid but the female usually covers them in a protective secretion which dries to form a hard, dark coloured casing. Female weevils can live for up to ten months, during which time they may produce from 500 to 1000 eggs at the rate of up to nine eggs per day. [3]

The eggs hatch in about a week and the larvae moult four times, eventually reaching about 1.4 millimetres long. They are yellow when newly hatched but later instars are gray and slug-like. As they develop they become covered with a translucent yellowish oily secretion which turns black as faecal material adheres to it. This coating may provide protection from fire ants and other predators. [4] The larvae often trail a black faecal string behind them. When feeding, they eat through all the layers of the leaf except for the cuticle on the far side, leaving paper-thin trails across the leaf surface as wide as their bodies. They take about seven weeks to develop and migrate downwards as they mature. [3]

The fourth instar is the puparium. The larva ceases to feed and crawls or falls to the ground and finds a suitable underground site in which to pupate. It develops a capsule about ten millimetres in diameter which becomes coated with soil that adheres to the oily surface coating. This stage lasts from two to six weeks but usually about four weeks. [3] Various soil types support pupation but success rates may be higher where soils are sandy and well drained. Sites with saturated soils or permanently flooded areas did not support colonisation when the species was introduced in Florida in 1997. [5]

Host range

This weevil feeds on Melaleuca quinquenervia, a tree in the myrtle family native to Australia. Tests were conducted in Australia to see whether any other plants acted as hosts to the weevil. Fewer than seven individuals were found on non-host species compared with more than a thousand on melaleuca. In laboratory tests, melaleuca was the only plant on which it proved possible to raise adults. [6] Before it was introduced into Florida the weevil was tested in quarantine on over one hundred species of plant growing locally including all the members of the Myrtaceae native to Florida. It was found that adults might sporadically feed on other plants but that the weevil did not reproduce on any other of the species tested. [7]

Use in biological control

The melaleuca tree, Melaleuca quinquenervia, was introduced into Florida as an ornamental and began to naturalize in about 1906. It was later planted extensively in order to help drain flooded portions of the Everglades. [1] Here it flourished and is now considered to be an invasive species and a serious threat to the ecosystem. In Florida it has no host-specific natural enemies and the introduction of certain insect species from Australia to help control it is being investigated. [8] USDA scientists imported four insect species into quarantine for evaluation. Of these, the melaleuca leaf weevil seems the most promising. Both adults and larvae were found to disrupt the plant's normal growth processes which may make the plants more susceptible to other control measures. At certain test sites where the weevil has been introduced experimentally, flowering of the melaleuca tree has been reduced by up to 90%. [9] This scale of damage may help to minimise the numbers of seeds produced and thus the spread of this invasive tree.

Related Research Articles

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Melaleuca is a genus of nearly 300 species of plants in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae, commonly known as paperbarks, honey-myrtles or tea-trees. They range in size from small shrubs that rarely grow to more than 16 m (52 ft) high, to trees up to 35 m (115 ft). Their flowers generally occur in groups, forming a "head" or "spike" resembling a brush used for cleaning bottles, containing up to 80 individual flowers.

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<i>Melaleuca quinquenervia</i> Species of tree

Melaleuca quinquenervia, commonly known as the broad-leaved paperbark, paper bark tea tree, punk tree or niaouli, is a small- to medium-sized tree of the myrtle family, Myrtaceae. It grows as a spreading tree up to 20 m (70 ft) tall, with its trunk covered by a white, beige and grey thick papery bark. The grey-green leaves are egg-shaped, and cream or white bottlebrush-like flowers appear from late spring to autumn. It was first formally described in 1797 by the Spanish naturalist Antonio José Cavanilles.

<i>Anthonomus eugenii</i> Species of beetle

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<i>Cyrtobagous salviniae</i> Species of beetle

Cyrtobagous salviniae is a species of weevil known as the salvinia weevil. It is used as an agent of biological pest control against the noxious aquatic plant giant salvinia.

Lissorhoptrus oryzophilus is an insect belonging to the order Coleoptera. It is native to North America, mostly in the southeastern part of the country, but has been established in California for over 50 years. A separate species of rice water weevil, Lissorhoptrus brevirostris is present in Cuba, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Suriname and Venezuela. Lissorhoptrus oryzophilus began spreading through the rice growing regions of Asia in 1976 ; in Europe it has been present in Italy since 2004, in the regions of the Piedmont and Lombardy where it affects upland rice production

<i>Helicoverpa punctigera</i> Species of moth

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<i>Hylobius transversovittatus</i> Species of beetle

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<i>Galerucella calmariensis</i> Species of beetle

Galerucella calmariensis is a species of leaf beetle in the family Chrysomelidae. It is commonly known as the black-margined loosestrife beetle and is native to Europe and Asia where both adults and larvae feed on purple loosestrife. It has been introduced in North America as a biological control agent for purple loosestrife.

<i>Gonipterus gibberus</i> Species of beetle

Gonipterus gibberus is a species of weevil in the family Curculionidae. It is commonly known as the eucalyptus snout beetle, the eucalyptus weevil or the gum tree weevil. It feeds and breeds on Eucalyptus trees and is endemic to Australia.

<i>Gonipterus scutellatus</i> Species of beetle

Gonipterus scutellatus is a species of weevil in the family Curculionidae. It is commonly known as the eucalyptus snout beetle, the eucalyptus weevil or the gum tree weevil. It feeds and breeds on Eucalyptus trees and is endemic to Australia.

<i>Samea multiplicalis</i> Species of moth

Samea multiplicalis, the salvinia stem-borer moth, is an aquatic moth commonly found in freshwater habitats from the southern United States to Argentina, as well as in Australia where it was introduced in 1981. Salvinia stem-borer moths lay their eggs on water plants like Azolla caroliniana, Pistia stratiotes, and Salvinia rotundifolia. Larval feeding on host plants causes plant death, which makes S. multiplicalis a good candidate for biological control of weedy water plants like Salvinia molesta, an invasive water fern in Australia. However, high rates of parasitism in the moth compromise its ability to effectively control water weeds. S. multiplicalis larvae are a pale yellow to green color, and adults develop tan coloration with darker patterning. The lifespan, from egg to the end of adulthood is typically three to four weeks. The species was first described by Achille Guenée in 1854.

<i>Listronotus bonariensis</i> Species of beetle

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<i>Hypera nigrirostris</i> Species of beetle

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<i>Sitona lineatus</i> Species of beetle

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<i>Metamasius callizona</i> Species of beetle

Metamasius callizona, or the Mexican bromeliad weevil, is in an invasive species in Florida, USA that targets several species of bromeliad. This species is native to southern Mexico, Guatemala, and Panama, and was first documented in Florida in 1989.

<i>Naupactus leucoloma</i> Species of beetle

Naupactus leucoloma is a species of broad-nosed weevil in the beetle family Curculionidae.

<i>Odoiporus longicollis</i> Species of beetle

Odoiporus longicollis, commonly known as banana stem weevil or banana pseudostem borer, is a species of weevil found in South Asia and South East Asia.

References

  1. 1 2 Ferriter, et al (2004)
  2. ↑ Featured Creatures
  3. 1 2 3 Purcell MF, Balciunas JK. 1994. Life history and distribution of the Australian weevil, Oxyops vitiosa (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), a potential biological control agent for Melaleuca quinquenervia (Myrtaceae). Annals of the Entomological Society of America 87: 867-873.
  4. ↑ Montgomery, B. R.; Wheeler, G. S. (2000). "Antipredatory Activity of the Weevil Oxyops vitiosa: A Biological Control Agent of Melaleuca quinquenervia". Journal of Insect Behavior. 13 (6): 915–926. doi:10.1023/A:1007870703128. S2CID   23221429.
  5. ↑ Center TD. et al. 2000. Field colonization of the melaleuca snout beetle (Oxyops vitiosa) in south Florida. Biological Control 19: 112-123.
  6. ↑ Cornell University
  7. ↑ Wineriter, Susan, and Buckingham, Gary. 1997. Love at first bite - Introducing the Australian melaleuca weevil. Aquatics 19:10-12.
  8. ↑ Turner, C.E.; Center, T.D.; Burrows, D.W.; Buckingham, G.R. (1997). "Ecology and management of Melaleuca quinquenervia, an invader of wetlands in Florida, U.S.A." Wetlands Ecology and Management. 5 (3): 165–178. doi:10.1023/A:1008205122757. S2CID   11993962.
  9. ↑ Rayamajhi, Min B.; Van, Thai K.; Pratt, Paul D.; Center, Ted D.; Tipping, Phillip W. (2007). "Melaleuca quinquenervia dominated forests in Florida: Analyses of natural-enemy impacts on stand dynamics". Plant Ecology. 192: 119–132. doi:10.1007/s11258-006-9231-3. S2CID   797276.
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