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Cold‐tolerance of the oriental cockroach Blatta orientalis
Author(s) -
Patourel G. N. J.
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
entomologia experimentalis et applicata
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.765
H-Index - 83
eISSN - 1570-7458
pISSN - 0013-8703
DOI - 10.1111/j.1570-7458.1993.tb01711.x
Subject(s) - biology , cockroach , acclimatization , hardiness (plants) , dictyoptera , botany , toxicology , zoology , ecology , cultivar
The cold‐hardiness of nymphal stages 1 to 5 and adult male and female Blatta orientalis was tested at 2°, −5° and −10 °C. The LT50 (time) of insects exposed to −5° ranged from 0.21 to 0.43 days. Acclimation at 10 °C for times varying up to 14 days progressively increased cold‐hardiness. A 14 day acclimation at 10° prior to exposure at −5°C increased LT50 (time) to 1.1–4.2 days for the various stages; prolonging the acclimation time to 28 days produced no further increase in LT50. All stages were rapidly killed at −10 °C (LT50<0.04 days) and survived prolonged exposures at 2 °C (LT50s from 16 to > 42 days) following acclimation. The potential for survival of outdoor populations of B. orientalis over winter is discussed.