Determination of the sterile release rate for stopping growing age-structured populations

ABSTRACT

A freely-growing age-structured population was modeled for growth and control by sterile male releases. Equilibrium populations yield critical sterile male release rates that would hold the population at equilibrium. It is shown here that these rates may be different from the release rates required to stop a growing population and bring it to an equilibrium. A computer simulation was constructed of this population and a parameter sensitivity analysis graphed the effects on the required sterile male release rate of fertility, mating delay in adult females, net juvenile survivorship, three adult survivorship curves, the time spent in the juvenile stages, and total life span. The adult survivorship curves had the greatest effect on the required sterile release rate for population elimination. The required release rate was also determined for Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann) using survivorship and fertility data from a laboratory strain. The concepts of over-flooding ratio and release ratio were discussed and quantified for the cases above.

KEYWORDS:

• Sterile insect technique
• over-flooding ratio
• growing populations
• age-structured population
• Ceratitis capitata

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Jorge Hendrichs for suggesting that I model the use of methyl eugenol and sterile male releases in combination (Barclay et al. 2014), without which the present topic would likely not have occurred to me.

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09670874.2015.1115913

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.