Department of Biology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV, USA.
Program in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV, USA.
J Insect Sci. 2023 Jul 1;23(4). doi: 10.1093/jisesa/iead075.
Intensifying drought conditions across the western United States due to global climate change are altering plant-insect interactions. Specialist herbivores must find their host plants within a matrix of nonhosts, and thus often rely upon specific plant secondary chemistry for host location and oviposition cues. Climate-induced alterations to plant chemistry could thus affect female selection of larval food plants. Here, we investigated whether host-plant water limitation influenced oviposition preference in a threatened invertebrate: the monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus). We found that females deposited more eggs on reduced-water than on well-watered narrowleaf milkweed plants (Asclepias fascicularis), but we could not attribute this change to any specific change in plant chemistry. Specialist herbivores, such as the monarch butterfly, which are tightly linked to specific plant cues, may experience shift in preferences under global-change conditions. Understanding oviposition preferences will be important to directing ongoing habitat restoration activities for this declining insect.
由于全球气候变化，美国西部的干旱情况正在加剧，这正在改变植物-昆虫的相互作用。专门的食草动物必须在非宿主基质中找到它们的宿主植物，因此它们通常依赖于特定的植物次生化学物质来寻找宿主和产卵线索。因此，气候引起的植物化学变化可能会影响雌性对幼虫食物植物的选择。在这里，我们研究了宿主植物水分限制是否会影响受威胁无脊椎动物——帝王蝶（Danaus plexippus）的产卵偏好。我们发现，雌性在缺水的窄叶乳草植物（Asclepias fascicularis）上产卵比在水分充足的乳草植物上产卵更多，但我们不能将这种变化归因于植物化学物质的任何特定变化。与特定植物线索紧密相连的专门食草动物，如帝王蝶，在全球变化条件下可能会经历偏好的转变。了解产卵偏好对于指导这种日益减少的昆虫的持续栖息地恢复活动将是重要的。
