Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T01:21:32.220Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Patchiness and long-term change in early Eocene insect feeding damage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2016

Ellen D. Currano
Ellen D. Currano*
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Penn State, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Many studies have examined temporal changes in insect feeding on angiosperm leaves, but none have considered variability within a single stratigraphic level. If spatial variability within a level is high, a single sample will not adequately represent the level and may either mask true temporal changes or create spurious ones. In order to measure the spatial variability in fossil insect feeding damage, I collected 12 replicate samples from two laterally extensive carbonaceous shale beds (55.2 and 52.6 Ma) from the early Eocene of the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming. Over 2800 fossil angiosperm leaves were scored for presence or absence of 50 insect damage morphotypes. Damage frequency, diversity, and composition were computed for both the bulk flora and individual plant species in each sample, and variation within a bed was compared with differences between the two beds. Differences in diversity and composition between beds were significantly greater than variations within a bed, and intra-bed variation was primarily due to differing floral composition. Damage frequency within a bed, however, was more variable than diversity. Damage diversity and composition reflect the number of insect species present, whereas damage frequency also depends on the number of insects present, which may be much more variable over small distances.

Type
Articles
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 35 , Issue 4 , Fall 2009 , pp. 484 - 498
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Literature Cited

Basset, Y., Aberlenc, H. P., Barrios, H., Curletti, G., Bérenger, J. M., Vesco, J. P., Causse, P., Haug, A., Hennion, A. S., Lesobre, L., Marques, F., and O'Meara, R. 2001. Stratification and diel activity of arthropods in a lowland rainforest in Gabon. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 72:585–607.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennington, J B. 2003. Transcending patchiness in the comparative analysis of paleocommunities: a test case from the Upper Cretaceous of New Jersey. Palaios 18:22–33.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bernays, E. A., and Chapman, R. F. 1994. Host-plant selection by phytophagous insects. Chapman and Hall, London.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bonelli, J. R., Brett, C. E., Miller, A. I., and Bennington, J. B. 2006. Testing for faunal stability across a regional biotic transition: quantifying stasis and variation among recurring coral-rich biofacies in the Middle Devonian Appalachian Basin. Paleobiology 32:20–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bown, T. M., and Kraus, M. J. 1981. Lower Eocene alluvial paleosols (Willwood Formation, northwest Wyoming, USA) and their significance for paleoecology, paleoclimatology, and basin analysis. Palaeogeography Palaeoclimatology Palaeoecology 34:1–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bray, J. R., and Curtis, J. T. 1957. An ordination of the upland forest communities of southern Wisconsin. Ecological Monographs 27:325–349.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burnham, R. J. 1993. Reconstructing richness in the plant fossil record. Palaios 8:376–384.Google Scholar
Burnham, R. J., Wing, S. L., and Parker, G. G. 1992. The reflection of deciduous forest communities in leaf litter: implications for autochthonous litter assemblages from the fossil record. Paleobiology 18:30–49.Google Scholar
Clarke, K. R. 1993. Nonparametric multivariate analyses of changes in community structure. Australian Journal of Ecology 18:117–143.Google Scholar
Clyde, W. C., Hamzi, W., Finarelli, J. A., Wing, S. L., Schankler, D., and Chew, A. 2007. Basin-wide magnetostratigraphic framework for the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming. Geological Society of America Bulletin 119:848–859.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coley, P. D. 1998. Possible effects of climate change on plant/ herbivore interactions in moist tropical forests. Climatic Change 39:455–472.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coley, P. D., and Barone, J. A. 1996. Herbivory and plant defenses in tropical forests. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 27:305–335.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coley, P. D., Bryant, J. P., and Chapin, F. S. 1985. Resource availability and plant antiherbivore defense. Science 230:895–899.Google Scholar
Currano, E. D., Wilf, P., Wing, S. L., Labandeira, C. C., Lovelock, E. C., and Royer, D. L. 2008. Sharply increased insect herbivory during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 105:1960–1964.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davies-Vollum, K. S., and Wing, S. L. 1998. Sedimentological, taphonomic, and climatic aspects of Eocene swamp deposits (Willwood Formation, Bighorn Basin, Wyoming). Palaios 13:28–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ellis, B., Johnson, K. R., and Dunn, R. E. 2003. Evidence for an in situ early Paleocene rainforest from Castle Rock, Colorado. Rocky Mountain Geology 38:73–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farrell, B. D., and Sequeira, A. S. 2004. Evolutionary rates in the adaptive radiation of beetles on plants. Evolution 58:1984–2001.Google Scholar
Fine, P. V. A., Mesones, I., and Coley, P. D. 2004. Herbivores promote habitat specialization by trees in Amazonian forests. Science 305:663–665.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fukuda, T., Ito, H., and Yoshida, T. 2003. Antioxidative polyphenols from walnuts (Juglans regia L.). Phytochemistry 63:795–801.Google Scholar
Hayek, L. C., and Buzas, M. A. 1997. Surveying natural populations. Columbia University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Karban, R., and Baldwin, I. T. 1997. Induced responses to herbivory. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
Kidwell, S. M., and Bosence, D. W. J. 1991. Taphonomy and time-averaging of marine shelly faunas. Pp. 116–211 in Briggs, D. E. G. and Allison, P. A., eds. Taphonomy: releasing the data locked in the fossil record. Plenum, New York.Google Scholar
Kraus, M. J. 2001. Sedimentology and depositional setting of the Willwood Formation in the Bighorn and Clarks Fork Basins. Pp. 15–28 in Gingerich, P. D., ed. Paleocene-Eocene stratigraphy and biotic change in the Bighorn and Clarks Fork Basins, Wyoming. University of Michigan Papers on Paleontology, Ann Arbor.Google Scholar
Kraus, M. J., and Asian, A. 1993. Eocene hydromorphic paleosols: significance for interpreting ancient floodplain processes. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 63:453–463.Google Scholar
Kursar, T. A., and Coley, P. D. 2003. Convergence in defense syndromes of young leaves in tropical rainforests. Biochemical Systematics and Ecology 31:929–949.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Labandeira, C. C. 2002a. The history of associations between plants and animals. Pp. 26–74 in Herrara, C. M. and Pellmyr, O., eds. Plant-animal interactions: an evolutionary approach. Blackwell Scientific, London.Google Scholar
Labandeira, C. C. 2002b. Paleobiology of middle Eocene plant-insect associations from the Pacific Northwest: a preliminary report. Rocky Mountain Geology 37:31–59.Google Scholar
Labandeira, C. C., Johnson, K. R., and Lang, P. 2002a. Preliminary assessment of insect herbivory across the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary: major extinction and minimum rebound. In Hartman, J. H., Johnson, K. R., and Nichols, D. J., eds. The Hell Creek Formation of the northern Great Plains. Geological Society of America Special Paper 361:297–327.Google Scholar
Labandeira, C. C., Johnson, K. R., and Wilf, P. 2002b. Impact of the terminal Cretaceous event on plant-insect associations. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 99:2061–2066.Google Scholar
Labandeira, C. C., Wilf, P., Johnson, K. R., and Marsh, F. 2007. Guide to insect (and other) damage types on compressed plant fossils, Version 3.0. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. Google Scholar
Lowman, M. D. 1985. Temporal and spatial variability in insect grazing of the canopies of five Australian rainforest tree species. Australian Journal of Ecology 10:7–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lowman, M. D., and Heatwole, H. 1992. Spatial and temporal variability in defoliation of Australian eucalypts. Ecology 73:129–142.Google Scholar
Quispel, A. 1954. Symbiotic nitrogen-fixation in non-leguminous plants. 1. Preliminary experiments on the root-nodule symbiosis of Alnus glutinosa. Acta Botanica Neerlandica 3:495–511.Google Scholar
Ribeiro, S. P., and Basset, Y. 2007. Gall-forming and free-feeding herbivory along vertical gradients in a lowland tropical rainforest: the importance of leaf sclerophylly. Ecography 30:633–672.Google Scholar
Richards, L. A., and Windsor, D. M. 2007. Seasonal variation of arthropod abundance in gaps and the understorey of a lowland moist forest in Panama. Journal of Tropical Ecology 23:169–176.Google Scholar
Royer, D. L., Sack, L., Wilf, P., Lusk, C. H., Jordan, G. J., Niinemets, Ü., Wright, I. J., Westoby, M., Cariglino, B., Coley, P. D., Cutter, A. D., Johnson, K. R., Labandeira, C. C., Moles, A. T., Palmer, M. B., and Valladares, F. 2007. Fossil leaf economics quantified: calibration, Eocene case study, and implications. Paleobiology 33:574–589.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, M. E., Singer, B. S., and Carroll, A. R. 2004. Discussion and reply: 40Ar/39Ar geochronology of the Eocene Green River Formation, Wyoming. Geological Society of America Bulletin 116:253–256.Google Scholar
Sokal, R. R., and Rohlf, F. J. 1995. Biometry, 3d ed. W. H. Freeman, New York.Google Scholar
Spicer, R. A. 1981. The sorting and deposition of allochthonous plant material in a modern environment at Silwood Lake, Silwood Park, Berkshire, England. U.S. Geological Survey, Washington, D.C. Google Scholar
Termonia, A., Hsiao, T. H., Pasteels, J. M., and Milinkovitch, M. C. 2001. Feeding specialization and host-derived chemical defense in Chrysomeline leaf beetles did not lead to an evolutionary dead end. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 98:3909–3914.Google Scholar
Wilf, P., and Labandeira, C. C. 1999. Response of plant-insect associations to Paleocene-Eocene warming. Science 284:2153–2156.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilf, P., Labandeira, C. C., Johnson, K. R., Coley, P. D., and Cutter, A. D. 2001. Insect herbivory, plant defense, and early Cenozoic climate change. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 98:6221–6226.Google Scholar
Wilf, P., Labandeira, C. C., Johnson, K. R., and Ellis, B. 2006. Decoupled plant and insect diversity after the end-Cretaceous extinction. Science 313:1112–1115.Google Scholar
Wing, S. L. 1984. Relation of paleovegetation to geometry and cyclicity of some fluvial carbonaceous deposits. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 54:52–66.Google Scholar
Wing, S. L., Bao, H., and Koch, P. L. 2000. An early Eocene cool period? Evidence for continental cooling during the warmest part of the Cenozoic. Pp. 197–237 in Huber, B. T., MacLeod, K. G., and Wing, S. L., eds. Warm climates in earth history. Oxford University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Wing, S. L., and DiMichele, W. A. 1995. Conflict between local and global changes in plant diversity through geological time. Palaios 10:551–564.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wright, I. J., Reich, P. B., Westoby, M., Ackerly, D. D., Baruch, Z., Bongers, F., Cavender-Bares, J., Chapin, T., Cornelissen, J. H. C., Diemer, M., Flexas, J., Garnier, E., Groom, P. K., Gulias, J., Hikosaka, K., Lamont, B. B., Lee, T., Lee, W., Lusk, C., Midgley, J. J., Navas, M. L., Niinemets, U., Oleksyn, J., Osada, N., Poorter, H., Poot, P., Prior, L., Pyankov, V. I., Roumet, C., Thomas, S. C., Tjoelker, M. G., Veneklaas, E. J., and Villar, R. 2004. The worldwide leaf economics spectrum. Nature 428:821–827.Google Scholar
Yamasaki, M., and Kikuzawa, K. 2003. Temporal and spatial variations in leaf herbivory within a canopy of Fagus crenata . Oecologia 137:226–232.Google Scholar
Zachos, J., Pagani, M., Sloan, L., Thomas, E., and Billups, K. 2001. Trends, rhythms, and aberrations in global climate 65 Ma to present. Science 292:686–693.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed