Survey on Scaphoideus titanus egg distribution on grapevine

Abstract: In the context of the Euphresco-Propscaph project, a survey on Scaphoideus titanusegg distribution on grapevine has been under way since January 2009. Samples of one and two tofour-year old vine wood of the “Trebbiano Toscano” variety from an untreated vineyard inLatium (Central Italy) and samples of one and two-year old of the “Kober 5BB” rootstock froman abandoned field in Veneto (North Italy) have been analysed. The vine samples, collectedduring the winter pruning, were stocked at 4°C till the beginning of the experimentation, whenthe same materials were cut into pieces of different lengths and put into rearing boxes (cm29x20x12) maintained at 24°C, 75% RH and LD 16:8 photoperiod to obtain the first instarS. titanus larvae. In the middle of May in two Latium untreated vineyards, several originalcapture devices were put on the plants, in particular around the trunk, the cordon, the cane of oneyearold and the buds of the vines to survey the emergence of S. titanus larvae. Results confirmedthat S. titanus females prefer to oviposit in the bark of two or more year old wood (0.09-0.31larvae per cm2), even if very few specimens were obtained from the one-year old wood (0.0002-0.0036 larvae per cm2) as well. The field experiments with the capture devices evidenced for thefirst time that even the bark of the trunk is a preferential site of the cicadellid oviposition as well.