Parasitism on seed predators overcomes the detrimental effects of defoliation on plant fitness in a tritrophic system

It is widely recognised that the interaction between plants and herbivores cannot be completely understood if the natural enemies of the latter are not included. Most studies looking at the effects of herbivores and their enemies on plant fitness only consider one herbivore species or guild; however...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Arthropod-plant interactions 2016-12, Vol.10 (6), p.535-543
Main Authors: Munguía-Rosas, Miguel A., León, Adolfo, Martínez-Natarén, Daniela A.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Attraction
Behavioral Sciences
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Cascades
Crop production
Defoliation
Ecology
Entomology
Fitness
Herbivores
Incidence
Invertebrates
Life Sciences
Natural enemies
Original Paper
Parasitism
Parasitoids
Plant Pathology
Plant Sciences
Predation
Predators
Seed dispersal
Seed predation
Seeds
Tri-trophic interactions
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Summary:It is widely recognised that the interaction between plants and herbivores cannot be completely understood if the natural enemies of the latter are not included. Most studies looking at the effects of herbivores and their enemies on plant fitness only consider one herbivore species or guild; however, plants in nature usually face the attack of more than one herbivore guild simultaneously and these herbivores may have a non-additive effect on the attraction with bodyguards and plant fitness. In this study, we asked whether folivory affects the activity of parasitoids on seed predators and whether this effect cascades down to plant fitness. We assessed these questions in a tritrophic system: the plant Ruellia nudiflora , its pre-dispersal seed predators and the parasitoids of the latter. Plants were submitted to either 50 % artificial defoliation or no defoliation (control). The number of seeds, fruit production and parasitoid incidence was assessed periodically in both sets of plants. Parasitoids indirectly and positively affected seed number, while defoliation had a direct negative effect on the number of seeds and an indirect negative effect on parasitoid incidence. However, the combined effect of defoliation and seed predation increased the indirect positive effect of the parasitoids on seed production, which overcame the negative effects of defoliation.
ISSN:1872-8855
1872-8847
DOI:10.1007/s11829-016-9459-3