Adaptations of insects to disturbance.

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-1-1985

Abstract

Emphasises the mechanisms and cues responsible for insect population responses to disturbance and to post-disturbance changes in community organisation - particularly considering insect dispersal and host selection behaviour, and resource quality and quantity. Disturbances can trigger exponential population growth in insect species that exploit such conditions, ie insects can themselves exacerbate disturbance conditions. Attention focuses on increased tree mortality resulting from such insect population growth and the resulting predisposition of such patches to subsequent disturbance. Selection among individual insects by disturbance can lead to interactions as the community level that could mitigate disturbance and contribute further to individual fitness, eg by concentrating herbivory on weakened or injured plants thereby favouring disturbance-tolerant species: insects may thus serve as regulators of ecosystem productivity. -P.J.Jarvis

Publication Source (Journal or Book title)

The ecology of natural disturbance and patch dynamics

First Page

235

Last Page

252

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