Morphological and genetic characteristics of Liriomyza huidobrensis (Blanchard) (Diptera: Agromyzidae) infesting potato crops in Korea

Abstract

The pea leafminer fly, Liriomyza huidobrensis (Blanchard), was found infesting and damaging Korean potato crops during a 2012 field survey. Localized outbreaks of L. huidobrensis were observed in Miryang and Goryeong counties in the south of the Korean Peninsula. This paper describes the morphological and genetic characteristics of the Korean population of L. huidobrensis. The dorsal color pattern on the abdomen, and an array of microsetae on the thorax, were the main diagnostic characteristics of this species. On the basis of an analysis of a partial mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (COI) DNA sequence, we found that intraspecific variation in L. huidobrensis was negligible, and that the distance between L. huidobrensis and a closely related species, L. trifolii, was estimated to be 7.4-7.6 K2P. This is the first report of the infestation of field crops by the invasive leafminer L. huidobrensis in Korea.