Anticarsia gemmatalis, Hubner, 1818

Anticarsia gemmatalis View in CoL

The eggs of A.gemmatalis are laid individually by moths on their host plants. They are green with bluish tones, hemispherical, and flattened at the base ( Fig. 1A View Figure 1 ). The micropylar rosette has cells demarcated by delicate ribs and is formed by seven to 11 primary cells, and the number of micropyles ranges from four to six ( Figs. 1B and 1C View Figure 1 ). The eggs have conspicuous primary and secondary ribs visible under an optical microscope at 400x magnification that are much more elevated and prominent than those delimiting the cells of the rosette ( Figs. 1A, 1B, and 1D View Figure 1 ). The primary ribs are distinctly more elevated as they extend from the rosette and subdivide towards the lower pole of the egg, reaching the cells surrounding the micropyle, whereas the secondary ribs do not reach the micropylar rosette and are less elevated. Between the primary and secondary ribs, there are less elevated transverse commissures that connect one to another resulting in small rectangular areas or rib cells ( Figs. 1A, 1B, and 1D View Figure 1 ). Aeropyles (1-2 µm) are located at the junction points of the radial and transverse ribs, sometimes present in pairs ( Fig. 1D View Figure 1 ). Additionally, they can have 29 to 33 primary and secondary radial ribs. We found that the average diameter of the egg ranges from 590 µm to 615 µm. The texture of the chorion surface appears undulated at lower magnification ( Figs. 1C and 1D View Figure 1 ) and relatively smooth at 12,000x magnification ( Fig. 1E View Figure 1 ).