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Beating the Australian
Bush for Melaleuca's
Enemies
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Scanning electron micrograph of
Fergusonina fly eggs (the
dropletlike structures) and associated
juvenile Fergusobia nematodes in
a melaleuca flower bud.
(K9389-20)
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A small, hard-working fly and its
nematode companion may help stop the spread of melaleuca, a weedy, invasive
tree that threatens to take over Florida's Everglades. Melaleuca outcompetes
native plants and is blamed for environmental losses of up to $168 million
yearly.
The beneficial fly, a member of the Fergusonina genus, is a natural
enemy of melaleuca, or paper bark tree. The nematode—a transparent,
microscopic worm—lives inside the fly. The duo may eventually join another
biological control agent from Australia, the melaleuca leaf weevil, in an
effort to halt melaleuca's Florida rampage.
ARS scientists with the Australian Biological Control Research Laboratory in
Indooroopilly—just outside of Brisbane and about 500 miles north of
Sydney—collected the golden-brown Fergusonina fly from throughout
its native range in Australia. Their laboratory, outdoor, and greenhouse tests
determined that the insect attacks melaleuca exclusively and poses no risk to
other plants. |
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Fergusonina fly.
(K9402-1)
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"That's one of the most
important challenges this fly has to meet if it is ever going to be released
outdoors in Florida," notes laboratory director John A. Goolsby, an
ARS entomologist. His team was the first
to single out the insect, nicknamed the "melaleuca bud gall fly," as
a potential natural control of the aggressive melaleuca.
In their experiments, Goolsby and coworkers with Australia's Commonwealth
Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, or CSIRO, caged the little fly
on test plants to see if it could successfully attack them. The procedure is
known as host-specificity testing.
"We found that this Fergusonina species is unlikely to survive and
reproduce on any species other than Melaleuca quinquenervia, the plant
that's on the move in Florida," Goolsby says. This information was
critical to garnering approval by the State of Florida to ship thousands of
Fergusonina flies to Gainesville for further testing by ARS colleagues
and University of Florida researchers. "We've now sent more than 28,000
Fergusonina flies to Gainesville," says Goolsby. Gary R.
Buckingham, an ARS entomologist, heads that host-specificity testing. He's with
the ARS Invasive Plant Research Laboratory's Gainesville team. |
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Systematist Sonja Scheffer
and technician Matt Lewis
use an automated DNA
sequencer to obtain genetic
data for investigating
relationships between
Fergusonina flies and
Fergusobia nematodes.
(K9389-3)
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The flies made the 9,200-mile trip
inside melaleuca galls. These mostly marble-sized swellings appear shortly
after the Fergusonina female lays her eggs in melaleuca buds. The tree
forms the round, pinkish-red or green galls where buds would have otherwise
developed into branches. Some of those branches would have produced flowers
that are vital for new seed.
Galls make a snug home in which the fly offspring and their nematode friends
can develop. Both species feed on the fleshy interior of the gall.
To learn more about the Fergusobia nematode and—most
importantly—to ensure it allies only with the Fergusonina fly that
attacks Melaleuca quinquenervia, ARS entomologist Ted D. Center arranged
for nematode expert Robin M. Giblin-Davis of the University of Florida to work
in Australia on an intensive, 5-month stint. Center is in charge of the ARS
Invasive Plant Research Laboratory, which is headquartered in Fort Lauderdale,
Florida. In Australia, Giblin-Davis collaborated with Goolsby, Matthew F.
Purcell, and Jeffrey Makinson at Indooroopilly, and with Kerrie A. Davies and
Gary S. Taylor of the University of Adelaide. |
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Melaleuca galls make a snug
home where Fergusonina fly
offspring and Fergusobia
nematodes can develop.
(K9402-2)
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Team Works In Tandem
"The fly and the nematode," says Giblin-Davis, "appear to have a
mutually beneficial relationship. A well-known example of this kind of
association is the wood-eating termite's relationship with cellulose-eating
bacteria or protozoans that live in its gut. These organisms help the termite
digest its food. In return, the termite provides protection for the bacteria
and an opportunity for them to spread.
"In the fly-nematode partnership," Giblin-Davis explains, "the
female fly helps ensure the nematode's survival by carrying nematode young in
her ovaries and depositing them—along with her own eggs—into
melaleuca buds. The nematode, in return, causes melaleuca to form galls, which
offer food and shelter for the young of both species."
The female Fergusonina fly lays an average of 24 white, dropletlike
eggs, accompanied by about 76 nematode young. While in the melaleuca buds, the
nematodes develop into females that reproduce without mating. The females
produce a new generation of both sexes. Within a few days, these young
nematodes mate. The mated females slip harmlessly into the developing
Fergusonina fly females and lay their eggs inside her. When the nematode
eggs hatch, the new little nematodes travel to the fly's ovaries—then exit
her body when she lays her eggs some 3 days later.
To find out if other flies and their nematode partners inhabit Melaleuca
quinquenervia, Giblin-Davis traveled more than 8,000 miles through
Australia, collecting flies and nematodes from melaleuca, eucalyptus, and other
closely related plants. In addition to his own examinations, and those of
Davies and Taylor, Giblin-Davis sent specimens for analysis to Sonja J.
Scheffer of ARS' Systematic Entomology Laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland, and
W. Kelley Thomas at the University of Missouri, Kansas City.
"DNA analyses and other tests by these scientists," says Center,
"clearly show that the Fergusonina fly and Fergusobia
nematode collected from Melaleuca quinquenervia are genetically
different from other fly-nematode pairs that attack other melaleucas and
eucalypts. Apparently, these teams have evolved to live, eat, and reproduce
only within a particular plant species." If the fly and nematode pass
host-specificity tests in Florida, ARS scientists will likely seek federal and
state permission to turn the pair loose at melaleuca-infested sites throughout
the Everglades.
"We'll probably begin at sites where the melaleuca leaf weevil—also
known as the melaleuca snout beetle or Oxyops vitiosa—isn't living,
so we can evaluate these biological control agents independently of one
another," says Center. Four years ago, ARS scientists in Florida and
Australia and their collaborators were the first to complete the extensive
research needed before the small, grey-brown beetle could be put to work to
curb melaleuca in the United States.
"Since 1997," Center says, "we've placed more than 53,000
melaleuca snout beetles in and around the Everglades. Many beetle colonies are
now thriving. We think the Fergusonina fly and the Fergusobia
nematode would complement the beetle's work, and significantly strengthen our
attack on melaleuca."—By
Marcia Wood
and Jesús
García, Agricultural Research Service Information Staff.
This research is part of Crop Protection and Quarantine, an ARS National
Program (#304) described on the World Wide Web at
http://www.nps.ars.usda.gov.
John A. Goolsby is with
the USDA-ARS and CSIRO Australian Biological
Control Laboratory, 120 Meiers Rd., Indooroopilly, Queensland, Australia
4068; phone 61-7-3214-2821, fax 61-7-3214-2815.
Gary R. Buckingham is with
the ARS
Invasive Plant Research Laboratory, P.O. Box 147100, Gainesville, FL
32614-7100; phone (352) 372-3505, ext. 124, fax (352) 955-2301. |
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"Beating the Australian Bush for Melaleuca's
Enemies" was published in the
April 2001
issue of Agricultural Research magazine.
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