PARENT SESSION
Contributed Oral Session 3: Herbivory: Plant - Herbivore Interaction
Monday, August 8, 8:00 AM - 11:30 AM, Meeting Room 513 E, Level 5, Palais des congrès de Montréal
Impacts of climate change on plant-mediated interactions between foliar and root-feeding insects.
Staley, Joanna*,1, Mortimer, Simon, Morecroft, Mike, Brown, Valerie, 1 Centre for Agri-Environmental Research, University of Reading, Reading, UK
ABSTRACT- Summer rainfall is predicted to decrease by 20-40% in the southern UK by 2080, due to climate change. Here, we present results from a long-term field manipulative experiment, conducted in a calcareous grassland system, which show that plant diversity is decreased by summer drought. As well as affecting the abundance of individual plant and insect species, drought can alter the occurrence and strength of interactions between species, through changes to plant and insect physiology. Our results demonstrate that the effect of drought on the interactions between root and foliar-feeding herbivores and their host plants is difficult to predict, and depends partly on the host plant's tolerance to drought, and on whether the plant's physiological response to herbivory includes an increase in concentration of defensive chemicals.
Key words: plant defence, drought, leaf miners, Elateridae larvae