Herbivory in global climate change research: direct effects of rising temperature on insect herbivores

By J. Bale, G. Masters, I. Hodkinson, C. Awmack, T. Martijn Bezemer, V. Brown, J. Butterfield, A. Buse, J. Coulson, J. Farrar and 9 more. 2002

1,681 citations recorded by the source corpus.

This review examines the direct effects of climate change on insect herbivores. Temperature is identified as the dominant abiotic factor directly affecting herbivorous insects. There is little evidence of any direct effects of CO2 or UVB. Direct impacts of precipitation have been largely neglected in current research on climate change. Temperature directly affects development, survival, range and abundance. Species with a large geographical range will tend to be less affected. The main effect of temperature in temperate regions is to influence winter survival; at more northerly latitudes, higher temperatures extend the summer season, increasing the available thermal budget for growth and reproduction. Photoperiod is the dominant cue for the seasonal synchrony of temperate insects, but their thermal requirements may differ at different times of year. Interactions between photoperiod and temperature determine phenology; the two factors do not necessarily operate in tandem. Insect herbivores show a number of distinct life‐history strategies to exploit plants with different growth forms and strategies, which will be differentially affected by climate warming. There are still many challenges facing biologists in predicting and monitoring the impacts of climate change. Future research needs to consider insect herbivore phenotypic and genotypic flexibility, their responses to global change parameters operating in concert, and awareness that some patterns may only become apparent in the longer term.

Subfields: Ecological Modeling, Ecology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/4e98ed49e51f08cae79725dfbe81b72fe9a065f0

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Ecological Modeling

In Ecology

Citations in the corpus

Phenology of High-Arctic Arthropods: Effects of Climate on Spatial, Seasonal, and Inter-Annual Variation (2008, background): “The consequences of climate change for the life history and population dynamics of many arctic arthropod species are, therefore, still largely unknown (Hodkinson et al., 1998; Bale et al., 2002).”
The Impact of Climate Change on Agricultural Insect Pests (2021, background): “These insect pests are expected to build up their populations and expand their geographic ranges to higher altitudes as average temperatures there increase [49].”
Pine processionary caterpillar Thaumetopoea pityocampa as a new threat for relict Mediterranean Scots pine forests under climatic warming (2003, result): “Warmer temperatures can trigger an uphill displacement of pests limited by low temperature (Ayres, 1993; Possingham, 1993; Harrington et al., 2001; Bale et al., 2002), as corroborated in our study system (Hódar et al., 2001a,b).”
Recent evidence for the climate change threat to Lepidoptera and other insects (2011, background): “The insects are also a highly diverse taxonomic group, and their biotic interactions as natural enemies of plants and other animals, decomposers, and pollinators are critical for ecological functioning and ecosystem services ( Ayres and Lombardero 2000; Bradford et al. 2002; Harrington 2002; Kremen”
The effect of temperature and humidity changes on insects development their impact on forest ecosystems in the expected climate change (2013, background): “…UTC It has been often pointed at the necessity of constant monitoring of insects range shifts and of selecting either species or groups of insect species that would indicate changes in forest environment (for instance, Ayres, Lombardero 2000; Bale et al. 2002; Logan et al. 2003; Menéndez 2007).”
Resilience in Agriculture through Crop Diversification: Adaptive Management for Environmental Change (2011, background): “Migrant pests are expected to respond more quickly to climate change than plants, and they may be able to colonize newly available crops and habitats (Cannon 1998, Bale et al. 2002).”
Eco-physiological phases of insect diapause. (2006, background): “…either seasonally or linearly, on an evolutionary scale (Hanski, 1988; Taylor and Spalding, 1989; Sawyer et al., 1993; Jeffree and Jeffree, 1994; Hoffmann and Blows, 1994; Lawton, 1995; Easterling and Ellner, 2000; Fiksen 2000; Bale et al., 2002; Parmesan and Yohe, 2003; Thomas et al., 2004).”
Diapause research in insects: historical review and recent work perspectives (2019, background): “There is a consensus in the recent literature that climate warming has positive effects on insects from temperate climates (Bale et al., 2002; Deutsch et al., 2008; Altermatt, 2010).”
Global patterns in background losses of woody plant foliage to insects (2015, background): “The effects of precipitation have been largely neglected in current research on climate change in general (Bale et al., 2002) and on the effects of climate on herbivory in particular.”