The transfer of conidia of Metarhizium anisopliae between tsetse flies Glossina morsitans and the effects of fungal inoculation on mating and blood meal feeding behaviors were investigated in the laboratory. Male or female flies were inoculated with fungal conidia (“donors“) and allowed to pair with fungus-free mate of opposite sex (“recipients”) at 1-day-interval up to three mates. Fungus-treated male or female “donor” flies as well as their mates “recipients” died from fungal infection. However, mortality in male “recipient” flies declined with successive mating, from 82.5 to 32.5 %. Fungus-treated males readily located female flies and mating was successful in most cases comparable to the controls. There were no significant differences (P > 0.05) in mean duration of mating, number of jerking movements between fungus-treated and fungus-free males for all the mating lines, except in the number of jerking movements when male flies mated with the 3rd line female flies. Fungus-treated and fungus-free female flies previously mated with treated and non-treated males showed refractoriness during subsequent pairings. The number of fertile female flies was higher (P < 0.05) in fungus-free than in fungus-treated treatments, thus producing more pupae. High concentration of fungus (3.0 × 10⁶ conidia ml⁻¹) significantly (P < 0.05) reduced blood meal intake of flies. This study has shown that fungal infection does not affect the mating behavior of tsetse flies and fly-to-fly contamination does occur during matings. These are important attributes if entomopathogenic fungi have to be used in auto-dissemination strategy and be integrated into sterile insect technique.

中文翻译：

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绿僵菌接种物在成年 Glossina morsitan morsitans 之间的转移以及真菌感染对采血和交配行为的影响。

在实验室中研究了绿僵菌分生孢子在采采蝇Glossina morsitan之间的转移以及真菌接种对交配和血粉摄食行为的影响。雄性或雌性果蝇接种真菌分生孢子（“供体”），并允许以 1 天的间隔与无真菌的异性配偶（“受体”）配对，最多三个配偶。接受真菌治疗的雄性或雌性“供体”苍蝇及其配偶“受体”均死于真菌感染。然而，雄性“受体”果蝇的死亡率随着连续交配而下降，从 82.5% 降至 32.5%。真菌治疗的雄性很容易找到雌性果蝇，并且在大多数情况下与对照相比，交配成功。无显着差异（P > 0.05）在平均交配持续时间中，所有交配系的真菌处理和无真菌雄性之间的抽动次数，除了雄性果蝇与第 3 行雌性果蝇交配时的抽动次数。先前与经过处理和未处理的雄性交配的经过真菌处理和无真菌处理的雌性果蝇在随后的配对过程中表现出顽固性。 无真菌处理的可育雌蝇数量高于真菌处理组（P < 0.05），从而产生更多的蛹。高浓度真菌（3.0 × 10 ⁶分生孢子 ml ^-1）显着（P < 0.05) 减少苍蝇的血粉摄入。这项研究表明，真菌感染不会影响采采蝇的交配行为，并且在交配过程中确实会发生飞蝇污染。如果必须将昆虫病原真菌用于自动传播策略并整合到昆虫不育技术中，这些都是重要的属性。