title: Leaf palatability, life expectancy and herbivore damage.
abstract: Observations on leaves from plants with a wide range of life-forms, ruderals to trees, indicate that palatability to insect herbivores is strongly correlated with the life-expectancy of the leaves. The amount of damage suffered in the field is however inversely correlated with palatability; although the rate of damage is less on unpalatable leaves, their longer life means that they accumulate damage over a longer period. It is only with extremely well-defended evergreen leaves, that the total damage is less than that experienced by less palatable (but short-lived) leaves. These observations are related to the current theories on relative palatability (the apparency theory and the resource availability theory), within the framework of the habitat templet.
authors.affiliation: Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, OX1 3PS, Oxford, UK.
authors.forename: T R E
authors.initials: TR
authors.lastname: Southwood
authors.affiliation: Department of Pure and Applied Biology, Imperial College, SW7, London, UK.
authors.forename: V K
authors.initials: VK
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.affiliation: Department of Pure and Applied Biology, Imperial College, SW7, London, UK.
authors.forename: P M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Reader
keywords: Apparency; Herbivory; Leaves; Life-expectancy; Palatability