Few keystone plant genera support the majority of Lepidoptera species

Abstract

Functional food webs are essential for the successful conservation of ecological communities, and in terrestrial systems, food webs are built on a foundation of coevolved interactions between plants and their consumers. Here, we collate published data on host plant ranges and associated host plant-Lepidoptera interactions from across the contiguous United States and demonstrate that among ecosystems, distributions of plant-herbivore interactions are consistently skewed, with a small percentage of plant genera supporting the majority of Lepidoptera. Plant identities critical for retaining interaction diversity are similar and independent of geography. Given the importance of Lepidoptera to food webs and ecosystem function, efficient and effective restoration of degraded landscapes depends on the inclusion of such ‘keystone’ plants.

Spatial phylogenetics of butterflies in relation to environmental drivers and angiosperm diversity across North America

“…Comparison of PD, RPD, and CANAPE significance for butterflies and flowering plants was done by visual inspection because a summary test was gauged to be superfluous given the striking regional differences between the two groups. We chose to compare butterfly phylodiversity with angiosperm phylodiversity instead of all seed plants, because far more butterfly host plants are angiosperms than gymnosperms (Narango et al, 2020). However, angiosperm phylodiversity was remarkably similar to seed plant phylodiversity (Figure S1), and similar comparisons were produced with both plant datasets.…”

“…Because our custom-built phylogeny was constrained at the analogous nodes of the reference tree (Espeland et al, 2018), these issues are at least minimized here. Finally, we did not directly consider known butterfly host-plant associations in this work, which may be especially important, given recent work finding the majority of Lepidoptera are supported by a few important plant genera (Narango et al, 2020). That information, incorporated into a spatial phylogenetic framework, would deliver a stronger process-oriented understanding of spatial co-diversification that has shaped terrestrial ecosystems.…”

Highly Diverse Shrub Willows (Salix L.) Share Highly Similar Plastomes

“…The genus Salix L. (Salicaceae) comprises about 400-450 species of trees and shrubs mainly occurring in the Northern Hemisphere (Fang et al, 1999;Skvortsov, 1999;Argus, 2010). Willows are ecologically and economically important, e.g., for biomass production (Smart et al, 2005;Karp et al, 2011), and they are considered as keystone plants for insect diversity (Narango et al, 2020). The reconstruction of the willow phylogeny has proven to be difficult based on traditional Sanger sequencing markers, which have failed to resolve interspecific relationships (Leskinen and Alström-Rapaport, 1999;Azuma et al, 2000;Chen et al, 2010;Savage and Cavender-Bares, 2012;Barcaccia et al, 2014;Percy et al, 2014;Lauron-Moreau et al, 2015;Wu et al, 2015).…”

Biophilia beyond the Building: Applying the Tools of Urban Biodiversity Planning to Create Biophilic Cities

“…In addition, new greenspaces can be designed with assemblages of native plants, replicating natural patterns in the proportions and spatial arrangement to create more coherent and ecologically functional urban landscapes [58][59][60]. Taking this approach of replicating native ecosystems can help support greater biodiversity in cities, because native insects, birds, and other wildlife often have specialized relationships with particular native plant species and are dependent on them for survival [61,62]. Incorporating native ecosystems into urban landscapes involves a process of translation and creativity to identify, design, and maintain sites with the appropriate conditions for native plant communities.…”