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Sexual Precocity of the Male Flour Beetle, Tribolium castaneum Herbst, and the Influence of Temperatures on Reproduction during Early Adult Life*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 May 2012

H. E. Erdman
Affiliation:
Biology Laboratory, Hanford Laboratories, General Electric Company, Richland, Washington

Abstract

In the flour beetle Tribolium castaneum single-pair matings of different age combinations, young (1 day old) and old (10 days old) maintained for two weeks at 29 ± 2 °C. and 70% relative humidity showed that males matured sexually on the second day of adult life; females matured on the fourth. Between days 7 and 14, regardless of age, productivity was expressed as a single straight line with zero slope and an intercept of 16.4.

Young x young pairs maintained at 25, 29 and 32 °C. had fertilities peculiar to the temperature. The higher the temperature, the earlier reproduction began and the greater the number of F1 adults per day during the two-week experimental period.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Entomological Society of Canada 1964

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