Macrochelid Mite, Macrocheles muscaedomesticae (Acarina: Macrochelidae) as a Biological Control Agent Against House Fly, Musca domestica (Diptera: Muscidae) in Egypt

摘要

Numerous species of macrochelids (Acarina: Mesostigmata) have shown capability to attack housefly larvae and eggs but it is presumed that only a few of them play a significant role in the control of flies in nature. Macrocheles muscaedomesticae (Scopoli) is one of several mites that feeds on eggs, newly hatched and small larvae of house fly Musca domestica L. This study provide avidence that macrochelid mite is attacking not only housefly larvae and eggs but also on housefly adults. Macrocheles muscaedomesticae mite was reared in the laboratory on house fly frozen eggs and first instar of larvae at constant conditions of 28°C±1 and 90% relative humidity using sterilized artificial diet. The mean incubation period of eggs, total immatures, female longevity were 0.7, 4.0 and 25.2 days, respectively when fed on frozen eggs meanwhile means were 0.8, 7.0 and 22.6 days when fed on first instar larvae of M. domestica . The total consumption of female was 131.1 eggs/female or 82.7 larvae. Results of the present study showed that the mean mortality percentages of eggs due to predation of three levels of predator 2, 5 and 10 individuals were 57.2, 74.9 and 96.5 after 5, 4, 2 days, respectively. Also, the larval stage of M. domestica was introduced with three levels of 10, 20 and 25 individuals for each level of predatory mite 2, 5 and 10 adults, respectively. Results revealed that the best results were recorded at the level of 5 mites, where the mean mortality percentage of larvae was 100% after one day when introduced with 10 houseflys larvae but it was 96% after two days when introduced with 20 houseflys larvae and 76.2% after three days when introduced with 25 houseflies larvae at level of 5. In addition, the present study provide evidence that mites can consume the housefly adult stage. Our findings indicated that the best results were recorded at the level of 10 mites where the mean mortality percentages of adults were 83.55%, the fly died after two days of one prey treatment, 62.5% after four days of two preys treatment while it was only 55.57% after three days of three preys treatment.