In many protected crops, augmentative biological control heavily relies on generalist predators, which continuous presence on the crop allows an early response to pest immigration and outbreaks. Persistence is possible by their ability to feed on alternative food, such as pollen, plant-provided or artificially supplemented. However, fitness is decreased when feeding on alternative foods, hindering performance. We present a new approach to face this challenge: genetic improvement for better fitness feeding on suboptimal food. Orius laevigatus is one of the main biological control agents used in greenhouse vegetable crops. A breeding process was carried out on the basis of a broad intraspecific variability exploration for 10-day fecundity feeding on pollen (14.2–37.9 eggs/female for 30 wild and commercial populations). Life history traits were finally compared between our two selected strains and three commercial, wild and acclimated-to-pollen unselected populations, both on rich (Ephestia eggs) and suboptimal (dry honeybee pollen) diets. Selected lines showed considerably improved values for longevity (1.5-fold), early (1.3-fold) and lifetime fecundity (1.9-fold), nymphal survival (3.5-fold), intrinsic rate of natural increase (r_m) (7.3-fold) and net reproductive rate (R₀) (6.7-fold) as compared to reference unselected strains when they were fed on pollen, although still lower than on the optimal diet. Selection feeding on plant material resulted in no trade-offs when feeding on the factitious prey. This improvement was due to genetic gain rather than to phenotypic plasticity to tolerate nutritious restriction. Finally, some potential contributions of these improved lines not only for augmentative biocontrol but also for artificial rearing are provided.

在许多受保护的农作物中，增强的生物控制严重依赖于通才动物，这种食肉动物持续存在可以对害虫的迁入和爆发做出早期反应。由于它们以其他食物为食的持久性是可能的，例如植物提供的或人工补充的花粉。但是，当以替代食品为食时，身体健康会下降，这会影响性能。我们提出了一种应对这一挑战的新方法：遗传改良，以更好地适应次优食物。紫是用于温室蔬菜作物的主要生物防治剂之一。在广泛的种内变异性探索的基础上进行了繁殖过程，以花粉为食的十日繁殖力（30个野生和商业种群的卵/雌性为14.2-37.9个卵）。最后比较了我们选择的两个菌株与三个商业的，野生的和适应花粉的非选择种群的生活史特征，这些种群均以高营养饮食（鸡蛋卵）和次优饮食（干蜂花粉）为食。所选品系的寿命（1.5倍），早期（1.3倍）和终生繁殖力（1.9倍），若虫存活（3.5倍），内在自然增长率（r _m）（7.3倍）显着提高。）和净生殖率（R ₀）（以花粉为食）与未选择的参考品系相比（6.7倍），尽管仍低于最佳饮食。以植物材料为食进行选择饲养时，以人为猎物为食时没有权衡取舍。这种改善是由于遗传获得而不是表型可塑性来耐受营养限制。最后，提供了这些改良品系的一些潜在贡献，不仅用于增强生物防治，而且还用于人工饲养。