A holocyclic aphid has one sexual generation a year, usually in autumn, in which males and egg-laying females mate and lay eggs that overwinter; the rest of the year females reproduce by parthenogenesis. An anholocyclic aphid skips the sexual stage entirely and reproduces asexually all year. UC IPM describes both patterns among pest aphids.
In practice
Indoors, the distinction matters for two reasons. Anholocyclic populations, such as rice root aphid in cannabis rooms, never pause. Holocyclic species such as the cannabis aphid can produce sexual forms and eggs after the flip to short days, so a room that seems clean can carry overwintering eggs into the next run.
Don't confuse with
- Parthenogenesis: the asexual reproduction both cycles use most of the year.
- Diapause: dormancy; overwintering aphid eggs are in diapause.
Small soft-bodied sap-sucking insects of the family Aphididae that cluster on stems and leaf undersides, excrete sticky honeydew and multiply rapidly by live birth.Reproduction without mating. Indoor aphids are all-female and give live birth to daughters that already carry developing embryos.Integrated pest management: preventing and controlling pests by combining monitoring, prevention, cultural, biological and, as a last resort, chemical tools against set action thresholds.Aphids that colonise roots and the crown below the medium surface, on cannabis chiefly the rice root aphid (Rhopalosiphum rufiabdominale), causing slow, unexplained decline.Phorodon cannabis, an aphid that feeds mainly on cannabis and hemp, colonising leaf undersides and buds and leaving honeydew and cast skins in flower.A programmed, hormone-controlled dormancy that a pest enters in response to cues such as short days and cool temperatures, ahead of bad conditions.The winged form of an aphid, produced mainly when colonies crowd or plants decline; alates fly to new plants and are caught on sticky cards.
