Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Letter
  • Published:

Host specificity of Lepidoptera in tropical and temperate forests

Nature volume 448, pages 696–699 (2007)Cite this article

Abstract

For numerous taxa, species richness is much higher in tropical than in temperate zone habitats1. A major challenge in community ecology and evolutionary biogeography is to reveal the mechanisms underlying these differences. For herbivorous insects, one such mechanism leading to an increased number of species in a given locale could be increased ecological specialization, resulting in a greater proportion of insect species occupying narrow niches within a community. We tested this hypothesis by comparing host specialization in larval Lepidoptera (moths and butterflies) at eight different New World forest sites ranging in latitude from 15° S to 55° N. Here we show that larval diets of tropical Lepidoptera are more specialized than those of their temperate forest counterparts: tropical species on average feed on fewer plant species, genera and families than do temperate caterpillars. This result holds true whether calculated per lepidopteran family or for a caterpillar assemblage as a whole. As a result, there is greater turnover in caterpillar species composition (greater β diversity) between tree species in tropical faunas than in temperate faunas. We suggest that greater specialization in tropical faunas is the result of differences in trophic interactions; for example, there are more distinct plant secondary chemical profiles from one tree species to the next in tropical forests than in temperate forests as well as more diverse and chronic pressures from natural enemy communities.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Caterpillar diet breadth for one temperate site, two subtropical sites and four tropical sites.
Figure 2: Mean diet breadth of 1,585 tropical versus 1,052 temperate caterpillar species.
Figure 3: Caterpillar species turnover among host plant species for eight forest and woodland sites across a latitudinal gradient.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Hillebrand, H. On the generality of the latitudinal diversity gradient. Am. Nat. 163, 192–211 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Hutchinson, G. E. Homage to Santa Rosalia, or Why are there so many kinds of animals? Am. Nat. 93, 145–159 (1959)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. MacArthur, R. H. & Levins, R. The limiting similarity, convergence, and divergence of coexisting species. Am. Nat. 101, 377–385 (1967)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Connell, J. H. Diversity in tropical rain forests and coral reefs. Science 199, 1302–1310 (1978)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Grant, P. R. & Grant, B. R. Evolution of character displacement in Darwin’s finches. Science 313, 224–226 (2006)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Farrell, B. D. ‘Inordinate fondness’ explained: why are there so many beetles? Science 281, 555–559 (1998)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Schluter, D. The Ecology of Adaptive Radiation (Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, 2000)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Thompson, J. N. The Geographic Mosaic of Coevolution (Univ. of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2005)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  9. Darwin, C. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (John Murray, London, 1859)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Wallace, A. Tropical Nature and Other Essays (MacMillan, London, 1878)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  11. Armbruster, S. W. in Plant–Pollinator Interactions (eds Wasser, N. M. & Ollerton, J.) 260–282 (Chicago Univ. Press, Chicago, 2006)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Novotny, V. et al. Why are there so many species of herbivorous insects in tropical rainforests? Science 313, 1115–1118 (2006)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Price, P. W. in Plant–Animal Interactions (eds Herrera, C. M. & Pellmyr, O.) 3–26 (Blackwell, Oxford, 2002)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Thomas, C. D. Fewer species. Nature 347, 237 (1990)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  15. Lewinsohn, T. M., Novotny, V. & Basset, Y. Insects on plants: Diversity of herbivore assemblages revisited. Annu. Rev. Ecol. Syst. 36, 597–620 (2005)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Irschick, D., Dyer, L. A. & Sherry, T. Phylogenetic methods for studying specialization. Oikos 110, 404–408 (2005)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Ødegaard, F., Diserud, O. H. & Østbye, K. The importance of plant relatedness for host utilization among phytophagous insects. Ecol. Lett. 8, 612–617 (2005)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Hajibabaei, M., Janzen, D. H., Burns, J. M., Hallwachs, W. & Hebert, P. D. N. DNA barcodes distinguish species of tropical Lepidoptera. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 103, 968–971 (2006)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  19. Janzen, D. H. Coevolution of mutualism between ants and acacias in Central America. Evolution Int. J. Org. Evolution 20, 249–275 (1966)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Coley, P. D. & Barone, J. A. Herbivory and plant defenses in tropical forests. Annu. Rev. Ecol. Syst. 27, 305–335 (1996)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Dyer, L. A. & Coley, P. D. in Multitrophic Level Interactions (eds Tscharntke, T. & Hawkins, B.) 67–88 (Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, 2002)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  22. Marquis, R. J. & Braker, H. E. in La Selva; Ecology and Natural History of a Tropical Rain Forest (eds McDade, L., Bawa K. L., Hespenheide, H. A. & Hartshorn, G. S.) 261–281 (Univ. of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1994)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Wilf, P., Labandeira, C. C., Johnson, K. R. & Ellis, B. Decoupled plant and insect diversity after the end-Cretaceous extinction. Science 313, 1112–1115 (2006)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. Hawkins, B. A. & Porter, E. E. Does herbivore diversity depend on plant diversity? The case of California butterflies. Am. Nat. 161, 40–49 (2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Tilman, D. Resource Competition and Community Structure (Princeton Univ. Press, Princeton, 1982)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Chase, J. M. & Leibold, M. A. Ecological Niches: Linking Classical and Contemporary Approaches (Univ. of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2003)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  27. Colwell, R. K. & Coddington, J. A. Estimating terrestrial biodiversity through extrapolation. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B 345, 101–118 (1994)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  28. Kiflawi, M. & Spencer, M. Confidence intervals and hypothesis testing for beta diversity. Ecology 85, 2895–2900 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Whittaker, R. Vegetation of the Siskiyou Mountains, Oregon and California. Ecol. Monogr. 30, 279–338 (1960)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. McGugan, B. M. Forest Lepidoptera of Canada Recorded by the Forest Insect Survey Vol. 1, Papilionidae to Arctiidae (Department of Forestry of Canada, Ottawa, 1958)

    Google Scholar 

  31. Gentry, G. & Dyer, L. A. On the conditional nature of neotropical caterpillar defenses against their natural enemies. Ecology 83, 3108–3119 (2002)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  32. Stireman, J. O. & Singer, M. S. Determinants of parasitoid–host associations: insights from a natural tachinid–lepidopteran community. Ecology 84, 296–310 (2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Stireman, J. O. et al. Climatic unpredictability and caterpillar parasitism: implications of global warming. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 102, 17384–17387 (2005)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  34. Coley, P. D., Bateman, M. L. & Kursar, T. A. The effects of plant quality on caterpillar growth and defense against natural enemies. Oikos 115, 219–228 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  35. Diniz, I. R. & Morais, H. C. Lepidopteran caterpillar fauna of cerrado host plants. Biodiv. Conserv. 6, 817–836 (1997)

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank D. Janzen, D. Gruner, G. Rodriguez, J. Landosky and R. Forkner for helpful suggestions for improving the manuscript; G. Howse for making available the CFIS data; E. Selig, A. Frevert, J. McGrath and M. Walker for their efforts in constructing the Canadian database; and a large number of taxonomists, field assistants and students for their help in generating all data. Funding came from the US National Science Foundation, Earthwatch Institute, National Geographic, Tulane University, University of Missouri Research Award, Wesleyan University’s Hughes Summer Research Program, and the National Institute for Climate Change Research.

Author Contributions All authors designed and performed data collection protocols and contributed substantially to writing the paper; M.S.S. proposed the original idea for the paper; M.S.S. and L.A.D. designed the analyses and wrote the first full draft of the paper; J.O.S., R. J. Marquis, J. T. Lill and R. E. Ricklefs contributed extensive revisions; L.A.D. performed statistical analyses and created figures.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana 70118, USA,

    L. A. Dyer & G. L. Gentry

  2. Department of Biology, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA,

    M. S. Singer

  3. Department of Biological Sciences, George Washington University, Washington, DC 20052, USA,

    J. T. Lill

  4. Department of Biological Sciences, Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio 45435, USA,

    J. O. Stireman

  5. Department of Biology, University of Missouri–St Louis, St Louis, Missouri 63121, USA,

    R. J. Marquis & R. E. Ricklefs

  6. Yanayacu Biological Station and Center for Creative Studies, Cosanga, Napo, Ecuador c/o Foch 721 y Juan Leon Mera, Quito, Ecuador,

    H. F. Greeney

  7. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, Connecticut 06269, USA,

    D. L. Wagner

  8. Department of Ecology/Zoology, University of Brasilia, 70910-900, Brasilia, DF, Brazil,

    H. C. Morais & I. R. Diniz

  9. Department of Biology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112-0840, USA,

    T. A. Kursar & P. D. Coley

  10. Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Panama City, Panama,

    T. A. Kursar & P. D. Coley

Authors
  1. L. A. Dyer
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. M. S. Singer
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. J. T. Lill
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. J. O. Stireman
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. G. L. Gentry
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. R. J. Marquis
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. R. E. Ricklefs
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. H. F. Greeney
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  9. D. L. Wagner
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  10. H. C. Morais
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  11. I. R. Diniz
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  12. T. A. Kursar
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  13. P. D. Coley
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to L. A. Dyer.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

Reprints and permissions information is available at www.nature.com/reprints. The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

This file contains Supplementary Data, Supplementary Methods and Supplementary Figures S1-S2 with Legends. (PDF 365 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Dyer, L., Singer, M., Lill, J. et al. Host specificity of Lepidoptera in tropical and temperate forests. Nature 448, 696–699 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature05884

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature05884

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing