Is body size a good indicator of fecundity in the genus Thaumetopoea? A story told by two intrageneric Mediterranean forest defoliators

Abstract

Abstract Body size correlates with several factors such as reproductive fitness, environmental changes, the quality and quantity of food during critical development stages, and the feeding season. For the Palearctic moths of the genus Thaumetopoea (Lepidoptera; Notodontidae), the larval development is crucial and differs between species according to their feeding season; larvae of the pine processionary moth Thaumetopoea pityocampa (Denis & Schiffermüller 1775) feed during winter while larvae of its congeneric cedar processionary moth Thaumetopoea bonjeani (Powell 1922) develop during summer in North Africa. This discrepancy in lifecycles leads to different reproductive traits such as egg batch length, number of eggs per batch, eggs protection mechanisms and female body size. According to Darwin's fecundity advantage hypothesis (1871), female body size should have a positive influence on reproductive fitness, since larger females supposedly have higher fecundity. The universal allometric scaling phenomenon rule proposed by Rensch (1950) predicts that the degree of sexual size dimorphism tends to decrease with the increase of female body size. Here, two morphometrical parameters that is, body size and scale size, estimated from body measurements of individuals of both species, feeding on the same host Atlantic cedar Cedrus atlantica (Manetti & Carrière 1855) (Pinales; Pinaceae) in Algeria were proposed. The aim was to find out traits that might rule the competition for food and space, in particularly fecundity and body size. Results of the present study highlight a female‐biased sexual size dimorphism in both species. The positive correlation between female body size and fecundity shown in this study weakly supports Darwin's hypothesis. Finally, the intrageneric test performed leads to conclude that Rensch's rule does not hold in the considered species.