Morphogenetical Studies on Egg Parasitoids Trichogramma Released to Control Lepidopteran Sugarcane Pests in Qena Governorate, Egypt

Abstract

The egg parasitoid Trichogramma was used in Qus, Qena Governorate, Egypt, to control lepidopteran sugarcane insect pests. The primary objective of this study was to identify the egg parasitoid, Trichogramma , by morphological and genetic approaches. Light microscope was used to examine the morphology of male and female adults and their measurements. Results showed that females were shorter than males in Trichogramma . Also, the external morphology of the antennae, wings, and male genitalia was recorded. The sequence of ITS2 of Trichogramma turkestanica was deposited in GenBank under the accession number of MW459187.1. Its nucleotide length was 434 bp. The nucleotide frequencies of adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G), and thymine (T) were 19.8, 28.3, 26.3, and 25.6 %, respectively. The C+G content was 54.6, which was higher than the A+T content. The tested species can be identified as Trichogramma turkestanica through combined morphological and molecular methods