Arabidopsis Pests

[Colin Purrington]

As for greenhouse plants, aphids attacked our Arabidopsis under field
conditions ('Columbia' ecotype transplanted to a field in Illinois).  At
this same site we have noticed leaf damage, although we didn't catch the
insect (or slug) in the act.  Also, we found two types of eggs on A.
thaliana leaves: small yellow eggs, usually in linear arrays of 5-10, and
small, white, sometimes solitary eggs positioned at the end of ca. 1-cm
long stalks.  We have not identified these eggs, however, so we cannot say
for sure that the contents would be pests of A. thaliana (for example, the
stalked eggs might be parasitic wasps specializing on aphids).

Colin Purrington

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Department of Ecology and Evolution
University of Chicago