Abstract
ABSTRACT Galls are structures of vegetal tissue modified by several biological agents, mainly dipterans of the Cecidomyiidae family. The galls are indicators of the gall inducers’ presence, because of the species-specific interaction between the gall inducer and its host plant species. The aim of this study was to expand the geographical distribution of cecidomyiids – usually known only to the type-locality – in species of Andira Lam. (Fabaceae) distributed in Brazil, through the presence of their gall morphotypes in host plants. We searched for records of gall morphotypes in Andira species in all inventories of insect galls in Brazilian biomes and in virtual herbaria in Brazilian and abroad institutions. We found six species of Andira with forty-nine registers of 20 morphotypes of galls induced by cecidomyiids. They were from 35 localities; of those, 15 Municipalities, five States and the Federal District are new points of occurrence. We found three new registers for the fusiform gall in A. fraxinifolia, four registers for the fusiform gall in A. humilis, two new registers for the lenticular gall in A. nitida, and six new registers for three morphotypes in A. vermifuga. No new records were found for the morphotypes of A. cujabensis and A. surinamensis. These results indicate that digital tools, combined with well-illustrated inventory data, are capable to expand knowledge about the distribution of cecidomyiids through the recognition of their specific marker, the morphotypes.
Highlights
Considering: (i) the high specificity of gall inducer and host plant species interaction, (ii) that the morphotype is a reliable marker of the interaction; and (iii) that the distribution of the gall inducer is circumscribed to the distribution of the host plant, in this work we aimed to verify matching between distribution of the cecidomyiids species and the Andira species in Brazil and to register the new geographical records using literature and virtual herbaria data
All the six species of Andira discussed in this paper are native and endemic from Brazil, except for A. surinamensis, distributed in Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Venezuela, Guiana, French Guiana, Suriname, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia, and A. vermifuga distributed in Peru and Bolivia
The fusiform morphotype of A. fraxinifolia induced by Lopesia indaiensis (Cecidomyiidae) has an expansion of distribution from four to six states, and three new sampling points (São Francisco do Sul/SC, Cananéia/SP, and Lençóis/BA)
Summary
Galls are the result of an abnormal growth process of cells, tissues or vegetal organs in response to the activity of biological agents as viruses, bacteria, nematodes, and insects (Shorthouse and Rohfritsch, 1992; Shorthouse et al, 2005; Carneiro et al, 2009). The gall-inducer insects have a highly specific interaction with host plants (Isaias et al, 2014), generating unique morphotypes that allow identifying it through specific characteristics, such as organ of occurrence, shape, color, size, indumentum number of internal locus (Isaias et al, 2014). In the case of cecidomyiids, 92.4% of the species are monophagous (Carneiro et al, 2009), which allow us to assume the identification of the gall inducer through the presence of its morphotype in the specific plant species (Skuhravá et al, 2014). The geographical occurrence of gall inducers may not be uniform due to several factors, including variation in natural plant composition and geographical position, especially in the North-South axis, with latitude-related variations (Skuhravá and Skuhravý, 2009)
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