[Syrphidae] Re: Question on males

Francis Gilbert Francis.Gilbert at nottingham.ac.uk
Mon Jan 14 12:13:37 GMT 2019


Offhand I don't know of any such paper. Observations like that would be hard to distinguish from collecting honeydew for food.

Females visiting flowers for food are probably non-gravid and so mating them makes sense. Females ready to oviposit have probably already been mated, and so much depends on whether they are prepared to mate again, and if so, what the order of sperm precedence is. I don't know of any work that measures sperm precedence in syrphids.

Francis

Dr Francis Gilbert, Professor of Ecology
Room B132, Life Sciences Building, School of Life Sciences
University Park, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 115 951 3215
website: www.nottingham.ac.uk/~plzfg
                ecology.nottingham.ac.uk

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From: syrphidae-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk [mailto:syrphidae-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of ximo mengual sanchis
Sent: 14 January 2019 12:09
To: Hoverfly discussion list <syrphidae at lists.nottingham.ac.uk>
Subject: [Syrphidae] Question on males

Dear all,

recently a botanist asked me about behavior regarding syrphid males. He did read  that some Syrphid males in Europe visit larval host plants with aphids, probably to search for females (?).

Do you know any reference or citation about this male behavior?
Rotheray and Gilbert (2011, pag. 7) mentioned that "some males patrol flowers when searching for a mate..." but not that those plants are infested with aphids.

Many thanks in advance.

Best,

Ximo

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