The influence of temperature and humidity on oviposition and hatchability of Amblyomma lepidum (Dönitz, 1808) (Acarina: Ixodidae) under laboratory conditions

The effect of temperature and humidity on the oviposition and hatchability of Ablyomma lepidum was studied. Above 90% of adult ticks applied on calves succeeded to attach and feed through 6–13 days. The development process was studied under three levels of temperature: 27, 35 and 40 °C, each level with five sets of humidity. Temperature rather than humidity affected all developmental parameters. It was found that high temperature of 40 °C, even at high humidity 75.5–97.8% significantly affected pre-oviposition, oviposition, pre-hatching periods, egg mass weight and egg conversion ratio (p ≤ 0.0001), hatching period and hatchability (p ≤ 0.05). The effect of humidity on the pre-hatching period and hatchability was highly significant (p ≤ 0.0001), while it was less significant on pre-oviposition and hatching periods (p ≤ 0.05). It could be concluded that the development process is influenced by the interaction of both temperature and humidity. However, humidity above 90% and temperature range of 27–35 °C seem to be the optimum requirements for ideal development of A. lepidum.