Short range attraction of Ceratitis capitata (Diptera: Tephritidae) sterile males to six commercially available plant essential oils

Abstract

Plant essential oils have a number of roles in insect pest management. For male Ceratitis capitata, this includes use of angelica seed oil as long range attractants and ginger root oil, which is exposure to sterile males to increase mating success. This is also called as aromatherapy in entomology? Neither of these plants are hosts for C. capitata and the chemical basis for these effects is unknown. Small cage bioassays were conducted to test short range attraction of sterile males to essential oils such as angelica oil, ginger root oil, Manuka oil, orange oil, cubeb oil, and tea tree oil. Previous research found all of these oils attracted males when undiluted oil (5 μL) was tested. Herein we compared attraction to undiluted and 100, 10, and 1 μg/μL diluted concentrations with n-hexane to determine if concentration affected short-range attraction, respectively. Undiluted angelica seed oil, cubeb oil and manuka oil attracted more males than dilutions of the same oils, however more males were attracted to orange oil and tea tree oil that was diluted to 100 μg/μL, and to ginger root oil that was diluted to 10 μg/μL. Overall, the highest attraction of sterile males (53%) was to tea tree oil (500 μg). Additional studies are needed to determine the chemicals responsible for this attraction, but bioassays of short range attraction to tea tree oil may be useful for quality control assessment of sterile males used in the sterile insect technique for pest control.