Oviposition preference for novel versus normal food resources in laboratory populations of Drosopila melanogaster.
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Date
1998-06
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Abstract
Female fecundity, oviposition preference and specificity on one normal and two novel food media were
assayed on four laboratory populations of Drosophila melanogaster, revealing considerable among- and
within-population variation in oviposition preference. Overall, there was a significant tendency of females
to prefer novel media to their normal banana food as an oviposition substrate. Specificity in the populations
was fairly high, implying that a large proportion of females tended to lay the majority of their eggs on
the preferred medium. The results showed that oviposition preference for a given food medium could be
affected by the alternative provided, and that, consequently, oviposition preference for a given food medium
versus another cannot be predicted based upon a knowledge of what the preference for each of the two
media was versus a common third medium.. Specificity, on the other hand, was not significantly affected
by the type of alternative food media provided in a given trial. Moreover, comparison of results from
fecundity and oviposition preference assays also showed that the egg laying behaviour of Drosophila females
in response to different food media may be different in choice versus no:'choice situations. Thus, a substrate
on which fecundity is higher than on another, when assayed in a no-choice situation, may not be preferred
over the other substrate when a choice between the two is provided to the ovipositing females. The latter
two results point to possible complexity in the responses of females to various oviposition substrates based
upon the overall setting of the assay, including the alternative substrates present for egg laying.
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Sheeba V, Aravinda Madhyastha N A, Amitabh Joshi. Oviposition preference for novel versus normal food resources in laboratory populations of Drosopila melanogaster. Journal of Biosciences. 1998 Jun; 23(2): 93-100.