Abstract
Mutualism between ants and honeydew producing hemipterans has been extensively studied. However, little is known on how ant-hemipteran mutualism impacts the co-occurring herbivores, which in turn affect the mutual relationship in ecosystems. Herein, we investigated the effect of ant-mealybug mutualism on the oviposition preference and spatial distribution of cotton leaf roller Sylepta derogata, a polyphagous herbivore, and in Apantetes derogatae performance, a larvae parasitoid of S. derogata. Leaf rollers constructed shelters for mealybugs to prevent them from enemy attack and preferred to lay eggs on plants with ant-mealybug mutualism. Egg abundance on mutualism-present plants was higher than on mutualism-absent plants. Leaf roller parasitoid A. derogatae showed higher parasitism on mutualism-absent plants. No obvious change in leaf roller egg abundance was observed when A. derogatae was excluded, suggesting that the parasitic pressure can also regulate the oviposition behavior of S. derogate. Apantetes derogatae showed higher aggressiveness in parasitizing leaf roller larvae at the absence of the mutualism. There was a definite correlation between leaf roller egg abundance and the number of patrolling ants on plants. Without ant-mealybug mutualism, S. derogata eggs showed a significantly aggregated distribution pattern, but a uniform distribution pattern was observed when the mutualism was present. Ant workers showed a consistently uniform distribution on plants. The results reveal a novel mediation effect of ant-mealybug association on the composition and structure of food webs in cotton field, which may contribute to a better understanding of the cascading effects of ant-hemipteran mutualism on other niche-related species in ecosystem.
Highlights
Mutualistic interactions among species play important roles in mediating the dynamics and diversity of niche-related community[1,2]
Several studies have elaborated the mutualism between ghost ant Tapinoma melanocephalum (Fabricius) and P. solenopsis[29,30,31], few experimental studies have evaluated the broad ecological effects of this mutualism on local arthropod community
Compared with competition and predation, little is known about the effects of mutualistic interactions on the function and stability of local ecosystems
Summary
Cotton plants were grown from seeds (Jimian 11, non-transgenic, Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences, Hebei, China) by cultivation soil (organic matter ≥20%; Jiangsu Peilei Technology Development CO., LTD) in plastic flowerpots (14 × 10 × 15 cm). Experiment Design Effect of ant-mealybug mutualism on oviposition preference of leaf roller. A completely randomized design was used to evaluate the effect of ant-mealybug mutualism on the oviposition preference of leaf roller in the cotton field of Huazhong Agricultural University (30°28′25′′N, 114°21′22′′W; elevation, 30 m). We tested the effects of mutualism on the oviposition of cotton leaf roller on plants with the exclusion of parasitoids. To determine the effect of ant tending on oviposition of leaf roller, the correlation between the number of patrolling ants and leaf roller oviposition was evaluated in field using cotton plants with similar size and growth. Independent sample t-test was carried out to analyze the differences in aggressiveness index, aggressiveness level of A. derogatae, number of patrolling ants and leaf roller eggs between mutualism-present and mutualism-absent treatments. All statistical analyses were conducted with SPSS, version 19.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA)
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