GENERAL ACTIVITY AND FORAGING TACTICS IN A WATER BUG

Diplonychus indicus is a highly versatile predator that forages both a ctively and from ambush. However, no correlations between predatory mo de changes and predatory performance have yet been evidenced. The hypo theses that time spent foraging actively was proportional to time spen t locomotory active and that time spent ambushing was proportional to time spent quiescent were tested during animal development. Locomotory activity increases during development due to increases in both freque ncy and duration of swimming bouts. The frequency of position changes increases as well. Egg-bearing males were less active than other adult s. However, the proportion of active foraging did not vary significant ly with developmental stage and no correlations between activity level and predatory mode were found. Changes in predatory tactics in Diplon ychus indicus differ from those reported in other predators as they ar e not related to any of the usual biotic or abiotic factors.