Lepidoptera Pest Species Response to Mid-Summer Fire

Abstract

In the American Midwest, summer fires are infrequent, and there is little information on their impact on ecosystems. After an accidental wildfire in a 20 ha grassland restoration, new growth provided effective substrate for the noctuid species corn earworm, Helicoverpa zea (Boddie), and tobacco budworm, Heliothis virescens (Fabricius). These agricultural pests feed on a number of important crop species and have been implicated in crop losses of up to 50 %. Invertebrate collections were made at 16 days, 45 days, 70 days, and 101 days post fire. A comparison of burned and unburned areas at 70 days post fire show 18 times the number of Lepidoptera larvae collected in pitfall traps in the burned area compared to the adjacent unburned area of the grasslands. These findings demonstrate that a mid-summer fire can affect the abundance of economically important insects.

Bat activity following repeated prescribed fire in the central Appalachians, USA

“…However, Reilly et al (2016) found that repeated prescribed fire in the southeastern Piedmont changed composition and structure of trees in the midstory but not in the overstory, indicating that foliage-roosting species may be less affected by fire. Many insect taxa, including Lepidoptera, that serve as prey for bats, also benefit from prescribed fire and associated increases in nectar-producing plants (Rudolph 2000) as well as new growth that provides a substrate on which to lay eggs and feed larva (Rudolph 2000;Evans et al 2013).…”