North vs. South: Contrasting patterns in the phenotypic plasticity of the firebug Pyrrhocoris apterus (Hemiptera: Pyrrhocoridae) at the latitudinal extremes of its distribution range

Abstract

In widely distributed insects, some life-history traits are conserved across the whole distribution range and are considered species-specific while other such traits differ geographically. This interplay of geographic variation and phenotypic conservatism is poorly understood even in relatively well-studied model species. Furthermore, a careful study may reveal that conventionally stable traits, such as the lower temperature threshold for development and the sum of degree-days, are both geographically variable and environmentally plastic. We studied how photoperiodic conditions and temperature jointly affect immature development, adult body size and wing polymorphism in two populations of the firebug from the opposite latitudinal margins of this species' range. All the three traits rarely clearly differ under short-day and long-day conditions or between north and south. Instead, we find prevalent temperature-by-photoperiod and temperature-by-origin interactions, which emphasize that it is not only the absolute values of these traits but the degree of their temperature-dependence, or thermal plasticity, that varies in time (in response to seasonal changes in day length) and in space (along latitudinal gradients). These results indicate that caution should be exercised when extrapolating any life-history traits in P. apterus beyond the season when and the location where these were measured. In particular, the use of a constant lower temperature threshold coupled with a constant sum of degree-days is likely to oversimplify the diversity of current and projected phenological patterns in this species.