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Article
Pictorial keys for predominant Bactrocera and Dacus fruit flies (Diptera:
Tephritidae) of north western Himalaya
C. S. Prabhakar
1,2, Pankaj Sood 1,3 and P. K. Mehta 1
1Department of Entomology, CSK Himachal Pradesh Krishi Vishvavidyalaya, Palampur, Kangra, Himachal Pradesh- 176 062,
India
2ICAR Research Complex for Eastern Region Research Centre, Plandu, Ranchi, Jharkhand- 834 010, India
3Crop Research Sub Station, CSK Himachal Pradesh Krishi Vishvavidyalaya, Sundernagar, Mandi, Himachal Pradesh- 175 019,
India
E-mail: csprabhakar.ento@gmail.com
Received 23 March 2012; Accepted 1 Ma y 2012; Published online 5 September 2012
IAEES
Abstract
A pictorial key for 13 species of fruit flies under 2 genera namely Bactrocera and Dacus of subfamily Dacinae
(Diptera: Tephritidae) is presented in this paper based on actual photographs of fruit flies collected from north
western Himalaya of India during 2009-2010. Among these, Bactrocera diversa (Coquillett), Bactrocera
scutellaris (Bezzi), Bactrocera tau (Walker), Bactrocera cucurbitae (Coquillett), Bactrocera zonata
(Saunders), Bactrocera correcta (Bezzi), Bactrocera dorsalis (Hendel), Bactrocera latifrons (Hendel) and
Dacus ciliatus Loew are the pests of agricultural and horticultural ecosystems. Bactrocera latifrons,
Bactrocera nigrofemoralis White & Tsuruta, Dacus longicornis Wiedemann and Dacus sphaeroidalis (Bezzi)
are the new records from the region of which host range has yet to be investigated. The pictorial keys
developed for these species will help the research ers for their easy and accurate identification.
Keywords fruit fly; Bactrocera ; Dacus ; Callantra ; Dacinae;
Tephritidae; taxonomic key.
1 Introduction
The family Tephritidae is one of the largest families of insect order Diptera (Drew, 1989a), comprising of
predominantly medium sized, pictured-winged and highly ornamented flies commonly known as “fruit flies”
as a number of species infest a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, flower heads, seeds, leaves and other plant
parts (White and Elson-Harris, 1992; Agarwal and Sueyoshi, 2005; Prabhakar et al., 2012). They are found in
nearly all habitats with suitable plant life. Their distribution is cosmopolitan covering tropical, subtropical and
temperate regions and they occupy habitats ranging from rainforests to open savannah except in Arctic and
Antarctic regions (Kapoor et al., 1980; Drew, 1989a, b; McPheron and Steck, 1996; Norrbom et al., 1998;
Michaux and White, 1999; Agarwal and Sueyoshi, 2005; De Meyer et al., 2010). These flies are widespread
over the entire world and richly predominant in the tropical and subtropical areas. Although the economically
important species account for only about 5 per cent of all tephritid species, they are a driving force for various
tephritid studies, including taxonomic ones. In Indian subcontinent, the knowledge of family Tephritidae has been based largely upon the monumental
monograph of Bezzi published in 1913 (Kapoor et al., 1980). Of 243 known species in 79 genera from India,
41 species of 27 genera have been reported from Himachal Pradesh (Agarwal and Sueyoshi, 2005). Recently,
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six fruit fly species were reported for the first time from Himachal Prad esh by Prabhakar et al. (2012). Out of
47 species of fruit flies report ed from Himachal Pradesh, 13 species belong to genus Bactrocera and Dacus
and majority of them are economically important pests of agricu ltural and horticultural crops of several
countries including India. The accurate identification of pest species is essential for any pest management
programme and regulating the entry of pest species to a pest free zone, but due to homoplasmy in
morphological characters of fruit flies, the accurate identification of species is very difficult for fruit fly
researchers who are not taxo nomists, farm workers and graduate students. Taxonomic keys are of utmost
importance in the identification of the species during different research programmes. Although there are a
number of taxonomic keys to identify the fruit flies of diffe rent areas/regions, but none is pictorial. Therefore,
an attempt has been made to prepare coloured pictoria l identification keys for accurate identification of most
important pest fruit fly species of genus Bactrocera and Dacus.
2 Pictorial Keys of Fruit Flies
1. Abdomen oval or elongate.......... ............................................................................................ ..............2
....................................... (Genus Bactrocera)
Oval abdomen
- Abdomen petiolate and elongate……………….............................. ………………........................ 11
.............................................. (Genus Dacus)
Elongated abdomen
2 (1). Lateral and medial postsutural yellow vittae present ...................................................... 3
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- Lateral postsutural yellow vittae present, medial postsutural yellow vittae
absent ........................................................................................................................ .................. 6
3 (2). Scutum black ........................................................................................................... ........ 4
Lateral postsutural yellow vittae
Lateral postsutural yellow vittae
Medial postsutural yellow vittae
Scutum
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- Scutum mostly red brown ................................................................................................ 5
4 (3). Scutellum yellow without an apical black spot ..................................................................
....................................................... Bactrocera (Hemigymnodacus) diversa (Coquillett)
Bactrocera diversa (Coquillett)
- Scutellum yellow with an apical black sp ot ......................................................................
..................................................................... Bactrocera (Zeugodacus ) scutellaris (Bezzi)
ra scutellaris (Bezzi)
Bactrocera scutellaris (Bezzi)
Scutum
Scutellum
Scutellum
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5 (3). Fore wings with cubital streak and costal band with a distinct large spot in wing
apex ............................................................................ Bactrocera (Zeugodacus) tau (Walker)
Bactrocera tau (Walker)
- Fore wings with infuscation on dm-cu crossveins in addition to cubital streak and costal band with a
distinct large spot in wing apex ........................ Bactrocera (Zeugodacus) cucurbitae (Coquillett)
Bactrocera cucurbitae (Coquillett)
6 (2). Scutum base colour red brown ....................................................................................... 7
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- Scutum base colour black ................................................................................................ 8
7 (6). Fore wings with costal band but either discontinuous or with an extremely narrow section distal to apex R
2+3 before expanding into a spot in wing apex .........................……………………………….
Bactrocera (Bactrocera) zonata (Saunders)
Bactrocera zonata (Saunders)
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8(6) Fore wings with costal band but either discontinuous or with an extremely narrow section distal to
apex R
2+3 before expanding into a spot in wing
apex .............. .............…………………………………... Bactrocera (Bactrocera) correcta (Bezzi)
Bactrocera correcta (Bezzi)
- Wings with continuous costal band confluent with R
2+3 ................................................. 9
9 (8). All femora with dark black marking ..................................................................................... ..........
Bactrocera (Bactrocera) nigrofemoralis White & Tsuruta
Bactrocera nigrofemoralis White & Tsuruta
- All femora entirely fulvous ........................................................................................... 10
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10 (9) Costal band confluent with R 2+3 not expanding into a distinct spot in wing
apex ...................................................................... Bactrocera (Bactrocera ) dorsalis (Hendel)
Bactrocera dorsalis (Hendel)
- Costal band confluent with R
2+3 expanding into a small spot in wing
apex ..................................................................... Bactrocera (Bactrocera ) latifrons (Hendel)
-
Bactrocera latifrons (Hendel)
11 (1). Scutum red brown with postsutural medial yellow vittae, lateral postsutural yellow vittae absent ........................................ …………………………. Dacus (Callantra ) discophorus (Hering)
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- Scutum red brown without postsutural lateral and medial yellow
vittae ………………………………………………………\
…………………….…………... 12
12(11). Costal band narrow, confluent with vein R 2+3 except at
apex ……….... ………………………………………………...... Dacus (Didacus) ciliatus Loew
- Costal band broad, usually confluent or overlapping vein R
4+5 ……………….……... 13
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13 (12). Costal band broad, usually confluent or overlapping vein R 4+5 not expanding into a large spot in
wing apex........... .........………………………… Dacus (Callantra ) longicornis Wiedemann
Dacus longicornis Wiedemann
- Costal band broad, usually confluent or overlapping vein R
4+5 expanding into a large spot in wing
apex
, reaching and crossing ve in M ……………………………..……………………\
… ..................
Dacus (Callantra) sphaeroidalis (Bezzi)
Dacus sphaeroidalis (Bezzi)
References
Agarwal ML, Sueyoshi M. 2005. Catalogue of Indian fruit flies (Diptera: Tephritidae). Oriental Insects, 39:
371-433
De Meyer M, Robertson MP, Mansell MW, et al. 2010. Ecological niche and potential geographic distribution of the invasive fruit fly Bactrocera invadens (Diptera: Tephritidae). Bulletin of Entomological Research
100(1): 35-48
Drew RAI. 1989a. The taxonomy and distribution of tropical and subtropical Dacinae (Diptera: Tephritidae). In: World Crop Pests: Fruit Flies, Their Biology, Natural Enemies and Control (Robinson AS, Hopper G,
eds). 9-14, Elsevier Science Publishers, Amsterdam, Netherland
Drew RAI. 1989b. The trop ical fruit flies (Diptera: Tephritidae: Daci nae) of the Australasian and Oceanic
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