A strain of the brown-winged green bug, Plautia crossota stali (Heteroptera: Pentatomidae) with blue-green body colouration: Genetic control and sexual competitivity

Abstract

A blue-green (BG) strain was established from a laboratory colony of Plautia crossota stali. This strain was characterized by a unique blue-green body colouration and pale green egg colouration with grey forewings, compound eyes and ocelli. The testicular epithelium for male adults was whitish in contrast to the orange-yellow colour for normal males. Reciprocal crosses between normal and BG strains indicated that the traits specific to the BG strain were recessive against normal phenotype and controlled by a single Mendelian unit. Double mating experiments in which BG females were mated with a normal and a BG male in this or the other order suggested that the sperm of BG males were as competitive as those of normal males. It was also found that the sperm of two males were mixed throughly soon after the second mating, although the precedence of sperm from a second male varied greatly for each female adult. The BG strain may be used as a genetic marker for behavioural, ecological and genetic studies in P. c. stali.