Zhu Chaodong's research team reveals the co-occurrence mechanism of herbivorous insects in subtropical forests

In an ecosystem, the most direct manifestation of whether species coexist is the co-occurrence of species, which can be used to test whether two or more species can co-exist
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Studying and understanding the related mechanisms of species co-occurrence and coexistence is not only a hot issue in ecological research, but also an important challenge

The Zhu Chaodong research group of the Institute of Zoology, the research group of Zhang Zhibin, the Markping research group of the Institute of Botany, Andreas Schuldt of the University of Göttingen, and Helge Bruelheide of Martin-Luther-Universitat, etc.
are based on the world’s largest tree species diversity experiment base.
(Figure 1), taking the phytophagous lepidopteran larvae on the tree as the research object, the pair-wise co-occurrence index between species was calculated, and the lepidopteran was studied on three spatial scales (tree body, tree species, and quadrat).
How does the distance on the system affect these co-occurrence probabilities
? In addition, the study also considered the impact of tree species diversity and tree functional traits on species co-occurrence
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The study found that the co-occurrence index of phytophagous lepidopteran larvae was significantly negatively correlated with the phylogenetic distance of trees and lepidoptera; the phylogenetic structure showed a clustering pattern on three spatial scales

The results of this study reveal the general mechanism of the coexistence pattern of herbivorous insects in the forest system: the phylogenetic relationship of lepidoptera, the functional traits and diversity of host plants, and the spatial scale all have important effects on the coexistence of herbivores
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The results of the study generally show that in the subtropical forest ecosystem, multiple driving forces can significantly affect the co-existence of species in the plant-eater community through the interaction between species, of which environmental filtration is the main driving force

The result of this study was published online on October 29, 2021 in Ecological Monographs under the title "Phylogenetic relatedness, functional traits and spatial scale determine herbivore co-occurrence in a subtropical forest"
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The study revealed the co-occurrence mechanism of phytophagous lepidopteran larvae across trophic levels, and was highly praised by the editor and two reviewers during the review process

Figure 1 Plots and plots

Figure 2 The relationship between the phylogenetic distance of Lepidoptera larvae and the co-occurrence index

Figure 3 The relationship between host plant diversity and functional traits and the co-occurrence rate of lepidopteran herbivores