Nilaparvata lugens (Stal)

Swezey, O. H., 1946, Notes On Some Fulgoroidea Of Guam, Insects of Guam II, Honolulu, Hawaii: Bernice P. Bishop Museum, pp. 149-156 : 151

3. Nilaparvata lugens (Stal) .

Delphax lugens Stal , Ofv. K. Vet.-Akad. Forh., 246, 1854.

Delphax sordescens Motschulsky , Soc. Nat. Moscou, Bull. 36: 109, 1863.

Nilaparvata greeni Distant , Fauna Brit. India, Rhynch. 3: 473, fig. 260, 1906.

Dicranotropis anderida Kirkaldy , Haw. Sugar Plant. Assoc. Expt. Sta., Ent. Bull. 3: 133, 1907.

Nilaparvata lugens (Stal) , Metcalf, Cat. Hemip., Fulgoroidea (3): 296, 1943.

In 1936, we found the rice leafhopper wherever rice was growing. Our collections of it were as follows: Inarajan, May 7, Bryan , Swezey, Usinger ; Inarajan , June 8, Sept. 30, Swezey; Merizo, Oct. 2, Swezey ; Piti , Sept. 1 , Nov. 22, Swezey ; Atantano , Sept. 3, Swezey . At Inarajan , Sept. 30, the leafhoppers were so numerous in rice seedling plots as to ruin the young plants. At that time they were coming to lights by hundreds in the village more than half a mile distant . At Merizo , Oct. 2; they were abundant in the seedling plots, but not destructive . In the evening of Nov. 30, this leafhopper was swarming at the electric lights on the dock at Piti .

This is one of several leafhoppers known on rice in the Orient. This1particular one has a wide distribution, and is known under different names in different places from India, Ceylon, Java, and the Philippines. On the authority of Muir, the names given above are synonyms (Haw. Sugar Plant. Assoc. Expt. Sta., Ent. Bull. 15: 16, 17, 1924), and lugens Stal has priority of date.

This rice leafhopper must have been a rather recent immigrant in Guam, for the first record I have found of it was in the Governor's Report for 1934, where a Megamelits is reported on rice at Merizo , Piti , Asan , Atantano, and Agat . As these include nearly all the localities where rice is grown, this leafhopper must have been already generally distributed. There was no mention of it in entomological notes of the Guam Experiment Station reports, which _wereissued up to the time the station was discontinued in 1932.

Usually the little green mirid bug Cyrtorhinus lividipennis was associated with infestations of this leafhopper, and no doubt feeds on its eg:gs as it does on the corn leafhopper eggs. At Inarajan , June 8, several leafhoppers were collected having dryinid larvae attached, and one male dryinid was reared. Its identity is unknown . Two species of ladybeetles were usually common in rice fields ( Harmonia arcuata and Coelophora inaequalis ) and are thought to feed to some extent on the leafhoppers.