Pulse beetle (Callosobruchus maculatus) is a common weevil that responsible for up to 24% of stored pulse losses. Using black gram grain storage, the efficiency carbon dioxide gas against all life stages Callosobruchus maculatus insects was tested at various concentrations and exposure times. The trials were carried out in pilot bins with capacity 25 kg. At CO2 concentration 50%, complete morta...

Female mating preferences can be secondarily lost for a number of reasons. We examined the preference of female pygmy swordtails, Xiphophorus nigrensis, for the sword, a conspicuous extension of the caudal fin in some males. Females failed to show a preference for conspecific males with swords when presented with live males naturally varying in sword length, with live males of manipulated sword...

Species recognition can often play a key role in female mating preferences. Far less is known about conspecific mate recognition from the male perspective. In many closely related taxa, females exhibit few obvious visual differences and males might have to attend to chemical cues in mate recognition, a possibility that has rarely been explored in vertebrates. Here, we examine male species recog...

A rapidly increasing body of work is revealing that the genomes of distinct species often exhibit hybrid ancestry, presumably due to postspeciation hybridization between closely related species. Despite the growing number of documented cases, we still know relatively little about how genomes evolve and stabilize following hybridization, and to what extent hybridization is functionally relevant....

Many studies of offspring size focus on differences in maternal investment that arise from ecological factors such as predation or competition. Classic theory predicts that these ecological factors will select for an optimal offspring size, and therefore that variation in a given environment will be minimized. Yet recent evidence suggests maternal traits such as size or age could also drive mea...

Brachypeplus habecki Cline and Skelley, sp. nov. is described from southern Texas, and Brachypeplus glaber LeConte is rediagnosed and discussed. Cyllodes thomasi Cline and Skelley, sp. nov. is described from southern Arizona, and Cyllodes biplagiatus is discussed. Habitus and genitalic photographs are provided as well as images of key diagnostic features for these species. An identification key...