Biotemas (Nov 2012)
Post-embryonic development of Cochliomyia macellaria (Fabricius) (Diptera: Calliphoridae), reared on two natural diets, under controlled conditions
Abstract
Cochliomyia macellaria is of medical and veterinary interest, because it is an enteropathogen vector and causes secondary miyasis, and low cost diets are needed that maintain rearing quality of this species. The objective of this study was to assess a chicken gizzard diet, compared to beef, in the post-embrionic development of C. macellaria. Forty neolarvas (3rd generation) were transferred to 80g diets (four replications/treatment). The body mass of the mature larvae was recorded and the larvae were transferred to test tubes, kept at T 30ºC day/28ºC night, RH 70±10%, 12 hours light period, and observed daily. There was a significant difference between the body mass of larvae reared on the chicken gizzard (0.067g) and beef (0.062g) diets. There was no significant difference between the mean duration in days of the larval (4.00; 4.17), pupa (4.09; 4.04) and neolarva to adult (8.07 and 8.16) stages based on the gizzard and beef diets, respectively. The mean larval, pupa and total viability (> 85%) did not differ statistically by the Student’s t test (at 5% significance). There was no deviation in the sex ratio and no abnormality was observed in the adults. The results suggest that the chicken gizzard diet is an efficacious and cheap alternative for rearing C. macellaria in the laboratory.
