title: Natal Host Plants Can Alter Herbivore Competition.
abstract: Interspecific competition between herbivores is widely recognized as an important determinant of community structure. Although researchers have identified a number of factors capable of altering competitive interactions, few studies have addressed the influence of neighboring plant species. If adaptation to/ epigenetic effects of an herbivore's natal host plant alter its performance on other host plants, then interspecific herbivore interactions may play out differently in heterogeneous and homogenous plant communities. We tested wether the natal host plant of a whitefly population affected interactions between the Middle-east Asia Minor 1 (MEAM1) and Mediterranean (MED) cryptic species of the whitefly Bemisia tabaci by rearing the offspring of a cabbage-derived MEAM1 population and a poinsettia-derived MED population together on three different host plants: cotton, poinsettia, and cabbage. We found that MED dominated on poinsettia and that MEAM1 dominated on cabbage, results consistent with previous research. MED also dominated when reared with MEAM1 on cotton, however, a result at odds with multiple otherwise-similar studies that reared both species on the same natal plant. Our work provides evidence that natal plants affect competitive interactions on another plant species, and highlights the potential importance of neighboring plant species on herbivore community composition in agricultral systems.
authors.affiliation: Department of Entomology, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, China, Key Laboratory of Bio-Pesticide Innovation and Application, Engineering Technology Research Center of Agricultural Pest Biocontrol of Guangdong Province, Guangzhou, China.|Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Huipeng
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.affiliation: Biological Sciences Department, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, Rhode Island, United States of America.
authors.forename: Evan L
authors.initials: EL
authors.lastname: Preisser
authors.affiliation: Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Qi
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Su
authors.affiliation: Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Xiaoguo
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Jiao
authors.affiliation: Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Wen
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.affiliation: Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Shaoli
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Qingjun
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Department of Plant Protection, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Youjun
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3508-6695
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003163:Competitive Behavior; D006430:Hemiptera / Q000145:classification* / Q000502:physiology*; D060434:Herbivory; D010944:Plants; D011157:Population Dynamics; D013045:Species Specificity