Raw sequence of: Field investigation- and dietary metabarcoding-based screening of arthropods that prey on primary tea pests

Predatory natural enemies play key functional roles in biological control. Abundant predatory arthropod species have been recorded in tea plantation ecosystems. However, few studies have comprehensively evaluated the control effect of predatory arthropods on tea pests in the field. We performed a one-year field investigation and collected predatory arthropods and pests in the tea canopy. Total 7,931 predatory arthropod individuals were collected, and Coleosoma blandum (Araneae, Theridiidae) was the most abundant species in the studied tea plantation. The population dynamics between C. blandum and four main tea pest species (Aleurocanthus spiniferus, Empoasca onukii, Ectropis grisescens and Scopula subpunctaria) were established using the individual number of predators and pests in each month. The results showed that the occurrence of C. blandum showed high synchronism with the occurrence of A. spiniferus, Em. onukii and Ec. grisescens. The prey spectrum of C. blandum was further analyzed using DNA metabarcoding. Among prey species, A. spiniferus, Em. onukii and Ec. grisescens were included, and the relative abundance and positive rates of target DNA fragments of A. spiniferus were obviously greater than those of other two pests.