| Drosophila melanogaster Meigen 1830 (Diptera: Drosophilidae) is the quintessential insect model organism. However, with a few exceptions, ecological features of this species have been poorly investigated. In the present work we describe a behavioural assay to quantify olfactory behaviour of D. melanogaster larvae in response to complex olfactory stimuli that are present in the natural environments, i. e.: rotten fruits that act as hosts in nature. Results obtained using this assay reveal that there is intra-population genetic variation and phenotypic plasticity for the character in a natural population from west-central Argentina. |
