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Copyright of Journal of Erciyes Agriculture & Animal Science is the property of Erciyes Tarim ve Hayvan Bilimleri Dergisi and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Crop plant domestication can change plant resistance to herbivores leading to differences in pest pressure experienced by crop plants and their wild relatives. To compare resistance to herbivores between domesticated and wild fruit trees, we quantified direct resistance and indirect resistance to a pest insect, the florivorous apple blossom weevil Anthonomus pomorum (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), for the cultivated apple Malus domestica and two wild apple species, the European crab apple M. sylvestris and the exotic M. kirghisorum. We measured weevil infestation and performance (weight, sex ratio), and weevil parasitism by parasitoid wasps for different cultivars of M. domestica and for the two wild apple species. To explain weevil and parasitoid responses to different apple species, we quantified tree characteristics including nitrogen content, size of flower buds, bark roughness, tree size, tree phenology and tree position. We found significant differences in susceptibility to weevil infestation between apple species, with lowest infestation (highest apple resistance) in M. domestica and highest infestation in M. kirghisorum. The suitability of apple species also varied significantly: weevils emerging from M. sylvestris were significantly lighter than those from M. kirghisorum. Parasitism of A. pomorum by different parasitoid species was significantly higher in M. sylvestris than in M. domestica. Infestation, weevil weight and parasitism were positively related to tree characteristics: infestation to bud nitrogen content and bark roughness, weevil size to nitrogen content and bud size, and parasitism to tree height and bud density. Our study revealed marked differences between apple species in susceptibility and suitability for the pest herbivore, but also for antagonistic parasitoids. Whereas direct resistance appeared to be higher in cultivated apple, indirect resistance via parasitoids was apparently higher in wild apple trees. Our findings suggest that wild and cultivated apple trees possess different resistance traits that may be combined to optimize resistance in commercial apple cultivars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]