LEAF‐ROLLERS AS ECOSYSTEM ENGINEERS

Abstract

Leaf-rolling caterpillars can act as ecosystem engineers because they provide shelter to secondary users. We reported the influence of leaf-rolling caterpillars on speciose tropical arthropod communities along both spatial (leaf-level and plant-level effects) and temporal scales (dry and rainy seasons). We predicted that rolled leaves can amplify arthropod diversity at both the leaf and plant levels, and that this effect is stronger in dry seasons, when arthropods are prone to desiccation. Shelter-building caterpillars are ubiquitous organisms in tropical and temperate forests, and can be considered key structuring elements for arthropod communities on plants, acting as diversity amplifiers at different temporal and spatial scales. (A) Larvae of the genus Anaea between the first and third instar on a leaf bridge built at the end of one C. floribundus leaf.. Photograph by G. Q. Romero; (B) Charaxinae larvae rolled in a C. floribundus leaf at the fourth instar. Photograph by G. Q. Romero. (C) and (D) Silk secreted by the caterpillar used to roll the leaf; (E) and (F) Charaxinae leaf shelters abandoned after metamorphosis. Photographs C, D, and F by G. C. O. Piccoli; and E by C. Vieira. These photographs illustrate the article “Ecosystem engineers on plants: indirect facilitation of arthropod communities by leaf-rollers at different scales” by Camila Vieira and Gustavo Q. Romero, tentatively scheduled for publication in Ecology 94(6), June 2013. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/12-1151.1