The Effect of Nutritional Quality of Some Plant’s Leaf on the Feeding and Development of Hyphantria cunea (Drury) (Lepidoptera: Arctiidae)

The fall webworm, Hyphantria cunea is a polyphagous herbivorous moth, damaging forests and agricultural crops. It has a great economical importance with damaging on especially hazelnut fi elds in TURKEY. Effects of food quality on feeding and development in larval stage were investigated. The last instar H. cunea larvae were reared during 14 days-feeding experiment using the leaves of Carpinus orientalis Mill., Quercus cerris L., Corylus maxima Mill. and Catalpa bignonioides Walt. Especially, the effect of some chemical compounds present in different plant species that used in current study on the feeding and development of the larvae was analyzed. Firstly, it was determinated that H. cunea larvae ingested both Q. cerris and C. orientalis, had high totalprotein content, less than both C. bignonioides and C. maxima, and had lower total protein content than the former plant species.However, there is no relation found between the ingestion of the selected plants and development of the larvae. This might be to result from more or less limitation of phenolic compounds such as tannins on protein digestion. On the other hand, there is no signifi cant relation between digestion effi ciency of the larvae and water content of the leaf samples(r = 0,468, p<0.01). The chemical analysis demonstrated that the total phenolics and proanthocyanidin (condensed tannin) contents were higher in Q. cerris and C.orientalis than C. bignonioides and C. maxima. This may caused lower pupal mortality in the larvae fed on Q. cerris and C. orientalis than the larvae fed on C. bignonioides and C. maxima. This may be due to the protection of larvae and pupae by tannins against viral and / or bacterial infections. Furthermore, the pupation time of the fall webworm were negatively correlated by the nitrogen contents of the leaf samples of food plants (r = -0.889, p<0.01). It was determined that the larvae fed on both C. orientalis and Q.cerris , had high ratio of protein content, completed the last instar of larval stage in shorter time period than the other two plants.