Cicadellidae (Hemiptera: Auchenorrhyncha) associated to maize crops in Argentina northwestern, influence of the sowing date and phenology on their abundance and diversity

LUFT ALBARRACIN, ERICA; PARADELL, SUSANA; VIRLA, EDUARDO G.

Maydica

Año: 2008 vol. 53 p. 289 - 296

The diversity of Cicadellidae (Hemiptera:Auchenorrhyncha) associated with the maize crop in Tucumánprovince (Argentina) was studied. Samplings intwo different sown dates, optimal and late, took placeduring the 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 growing seasons.The cicadellids were sampled from the coleoptile emergenceto the vegetative stage V10. Thirty five species, belongingto six subfamilies, were identified, of which fifteenspecies were new records to Tucumán province, andnine were registered for the first time inhabiting maizeagro-ecosystems. The most abundant and frequentspecies was Dalbulus maidis (DeLong & Wolcott), followedby Agalliana ensigera Oman and Chlorotettixfraterculus (Berg), which were present in all 44 samples.The diversity indices obtained were H’=1.75 and D=0.47for the optimal sown date, and H’=0.46 and D=1.52 forthe late one, being Dalbulus maidis the species withhighest relative importance in both sown dates. Curves ofseasonal abundance for the five most common specieswere showed.