Abstract
Dispersal plays a crucial role in many aspects of species' life histories, yet is often difficult to measure directly. This is particularly true for many insects, especially nocturnal species (e.g. moths) that cannot be easily observed under natural field conditions. Consequently, over the past five decades, laboratory tethered flight techniques have been developed as a means of measuring insect flight duration and speed. However, these previous designs have tended to focus on single species (typically migrant pests), and here we describe an improved apparatus that allows the study of flight ability in a wide range of insect body sizes and types. Obtaining dispersal information from a range of species is crucial for understanding insect population dynamics and range shifts. Our new laboratory tethered flight apparatus automatically records flight duration, speed, and distance of individual insects. The rotational tethered flight mill has very low friction and the arm to which flying insects are attached is extremely lightweight while remaining rigid and strong, permitting both small and large insects to be studied. The apparatus is compact and thus allows many individuals to be studied simultaneously under controlled laboratory conditions. We demonstrate the performance of the apparatus by using the mills to assess the flight capability of 24 species of British noctuid moths, ranging in size from 12-27mm forewing length (~40-660mg body mass). We validate the new technique by comparing our tethered flight data with existing information on dispersal ability of noctuids from the published literature and expert opinion. Values for tethered flight variables were in agreement with existing knowledge of dispersal ability in these species, supporting the use of this method to quantify dispersal in insects. Importantly, this new technology opens up the potential to investigate genetic and environmental factors affecting insect dispersal among a wide range of species.
Highlights
Dispersal is a key facet of species’ ecology and evolution, and it has profound effects on population dynamics, gene flow, and range size (Clobert et al 2001; Bowler and Benton 2005; Lester et al 2007)
Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd
We concluded that that “total distance flown overnight” and “maximum speed” were the best tethered flight variables to analyse that captured most of the variation in flight in our study species
Summary
Dispersal is a key facet of species’ ecology and evolution, and it has profound effects on population dynamics, gene flow, and range size (Clobert et al 2001; Bowler and Benton 2005; Lester et al 2007). Obtaining direct measures of dispersal ability can be challenging, especially in insects, making it important to develop new tools for measuring species’ flight capability. Over the past 50 years, a variety of laboratory techniques has been developed to measure flight ability of insects under controlled and experimental conditions, including methods for measuring free-flying insects (Kennedy and Booth 1963) as well as tethered individuals (Dingle 1965).
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