Comparing parasitoid life histories

Article English OPEN
Mayhew, Peter John
  • Subject: 1100
Species and clades are characterized by their unique combinations, or suites, of different life history traits. In parasitoids, traits include a core group common to other organisms, and a parasitoid-specific group. These organize into several sets of mutually covarying traits which overlap a little, but not wholly, with other sets. Across parasitoid species, host size, clutch size and body size tend to covary. Roughly independent of these is a dichotomy between idiobionts (host does not develop after parasitization), which tend to have fast development but slow adult life histories, and koinobionts (hosts develop after parasitization) with the opposite set of traits. Consistent links between the dichotomy and host characteristics remain elusive. A low ovigeny index (low allocation to early reproduction) is found in idiobionts, and is a predictor of some of the dichotomous set, but also more host feeding, egg resorption, solitary development, and larger bodies. Variation in fecundity, in taxonomically-restricted studies, is predicted by the host stage attacked, but this is not reflected in taxonomically-broad studies. The reasons behind trait co-variation are only partly understood. Analyses of evolutionary lability suggest that variation in development mode and body size tends to be clustered within higher taxonomic levels, with variation in other traits such as lifespan, fecundity and egg size more evenly distributed across taxonomic levels. Thus, taxonomically constrained radiations of parasitoids tend to retain a particular suite of traits that revolve around fundamental shifts in hosts and their use that occur relatively rarely. Parasitoids illustrate how the fast-slow continuum can be much less extensive than in mammals, how the ecology of the host affects the life histories of parasitic organisms, how different taxa require different life history theories, and how understanding resource allocation in early adult life can help explain life history variation.
  • References (14)
    14 references, page 1 of 2

    4 7 E 5 %1997) Interspecific allometries are biproducts of body size optimization. American Naturalist 149: 352,380.

    Law R. & Grey DR (1989) Evolution of yields from populations with age,specific cropping. Evolutionary Ecology 3: 343-359.

    Le Masurier AD (1987) A comparative study of the relationship between host size and brood size in spp. (Hymenoptera: Braconidae). Ecological Entomology 12: 383,393.

    Lewis HM, Tosh CR, O'Keefe S, Shuker DM, West SA & Mayhew PJ (2010) Constraints on adaptation: explaining deviation from optimal sex ratio using artificFialneural networks. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 23: 1708,1719.

    MacArthur RH & oWilson EO (1967) The Theory of Island Biogeography. Princeton University Prerss, Princeton NJ, USA.

    Macedo MV, Monteiro RF, Silveira MP & Mayhew PJ (2013) Male,male contests for P mates, sexual dimorphism, and sex ratio in a natural population of a solitary parasitoid. Behavioural eProcesses 100: 1,8.

    Mayhew PJ (1998a) The evolution eof gregariousness in parasitoid wasps. Proceedings of the Royal Society of Londorn,Series B 265: 383,389.

    Mayhew PJ (1998b) Offspring size,number Rstrategy in the bethylid parasitoid . Behavioral Ecology 9: 54,59.

    Mayhew PJ (1998c) The life,histories of parasitoid wasps developing in small v gregarious broods. Netherlands Journal of Zoology 48: 225,240.

    Mayhew PJ (2006) Discovering Evolutionary Ecology: Beringing Together Ecology and Evolution. Oxford University Press, Oxford, UKw.

  • Metrics
    0
    views in OpenAIRE
    0
    views in local repository
    38
    downloads in local repository

    The information is available from the following content providers:

    From Number Of Views Number Of Downloads
    White Rose Research Online - IRUS-UK 0 38
Share - Bookmark