Behavioral mechanisms underlie an ant-plant mutualism
Behavioral mechanisms underlie an ant-plant mutualism
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蚂蚁与植物互利共生的行为机制
DOI：
10.1007/s00442-002-1168-1
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发表时间：
2003
期刊：
影响因子：
2.7
通讯作者：
J. White
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Jennifer A. Rudgers;Jillian G. Hodgen;J. White
捕食者可以通过消耗食草动物（消耗效应）和改变食草动物的行为，生活史，生理或分布（非消耗效应）来减少食草动物。捕食者对猎物的非消耗性或特征介导的影响在群落动态中可能具有重要的功能。在兼性蚂蚁植物共生，我们调查了这些非消耗性的影响是否会影响猎物的寄主植物。在这里，捕食性蚂蚁（Forelius pruinosus）消耗和干扰一个占主导地位的鳞翅目食叶动物（Bucculatrix thurberiella）的野生棉花植物（Gossypium thurberi）。长达一个季节的蚂蚁排斥实验表明，蚂蚁对B的损害有更大的比例影响。thurberiella比毛虫丰富，这一结果表明蚂蚁有很强的非消费效应。在两个种群中进行了两年多的行为实验，结果表明B。由于蚂蚁诱导的毛虫行为的变化，在蚂蚁存在下，Thurberiellacartpillars基本上不太可能损害野生棉花叶。在没有蚂蚁的情况下，毛毛虫花了更多的时间静止（潜在的进食时间），而通过一根丝线从叶子上掉落的时间比蚂蚁存在时少。此外，蚂蚁改变了毛虫和损害的空间分布;毛虫花了相对更多的时间在叶片的上表面，并造成损害进一步从叶缘在蚂蚁排斥治疗。与蚂蚁的直接接触和蚂蚁在树叶上行走时传递的信息是导致毛虫反捕食行为的关键事件。这项研究有助于从陆地系统的一个小机构的证据表明，性状介导的影响捕食者可以级联到猎物的寄主植物。
Predators can reduce herbivory by consuming herbivores (a consumptive effect) and by altering herbivore behavior, life history, physiology or distribution (non-consumptive effects). The non-consumptive, or trait-mediated, effects of predators on prey may have important functions in the dynamics of communities. In a facultative ant-plant mutualism, we investigated whether these non-consumptive effects influenced the host plants of prey. Here, predaceous ants (Forelius pruinosus) consume and disturb a dominant lepidopteran folivore (Bucculatrix thurberiella) of wild cotton plants (Gossypium thurberi). Season-long ant exclusion experiments revealed that ants had a larger proportional effect on damage by B. thurberiella than on caterpillar abundance, a result that suggests ants have a strong non-consumptive effect. Behavioral experiments conducted in two populations over 2 years demonstrated that B. thurberiella caterpillars were substantially less likely to damage wild cotton leaves in the presence of ants due to ant-induced changes in caterpillar behavior. In the absence of ants caterpillars spent more time stationary (potential feeding time) and less time dropping from leaves by a thread of silk than when ants were present. Furthermore, ants altered the spatial distribution of both caterpillars and damage; caterpillars spent relatively more time on the upper surfaces of leaves and caused damage further from the leaf margin in ant exclusion treatments. Both direct encounters with ants and information conveyed when ants walked onto leaves were key events leading to the anti-predator behaviors of caterpillars. This study contributes to a small body of evidence from terrestrial systems demonstrating that the trait-mediated effects of predators can cascade to the host plants of prey.