Abstract
Novel host plant–insect interactions often arise from human-mediated introductions of potential hosts to areas inhabited by native insects, or invasive insects to regions with suitable hosts. These novel interactions may drive ecological and evolutionary change in native species. Here we investigate the role of the introduction of the prickly pear Opuntia ficus-indica on the demographic history of the native moth Cactoblastis cactorum. The latter became a pest in its native range after the introduction of the economically cultivated prickly pear. We evaluated potential scenarios of long-term population size changes by applying a demographic simulation framework to a large set of high-throughput sequence data. We sampled populations of the cactus moth from regions of historical incidence of prickly pear crop, in central and northwestern Argentina. To shed insight into the shared history of the exotic cactus/native moth system we integrated the historical records of the introduction of O. ficus-indica in South America into the demographic simulation. We also included a null hypothesis of stable population and/or ancient population changes. Our results reveal population size changes in both Quaternary and contemporary C. cactorum populations. Simulations pointed to a recent population expansion that coincided with the hypothesis of the introduction of the prickly pear after the arrival of Europeans in South America. The presence of the new host during the last centuries apparently prompted the expansion of C. cactorum. Overall, our results are of interest to understand the ongoing impact of introduced species and the complex ecological adjustments of native insects that occur with the introduction of new hosts.
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Data availability
Following open research and reproducibility principles, our study's datasets can be accessed on Figshare (https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.23938227), and the automation of demographic simulation framework is available on GitHub (https://github.com/niconm89/pipeFSC). The raw reads are accessible through NCBI under BioProject PRJNA666743.
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the Associate Editor and two anonymous reviewers for suggestions that helped to improve previous versions of this paper. We express our gratitude to Guillermo Logarzo (FuEDEI) and Stephen Hight (USDA) for their fieldwork support and valuable insights during the conception of this study, and Arabella Peard Bugliani (FuEDEI) for her revision and comments on English use and grammar. We would like to thank Biocódices S.A. for granting the use of computational resources. Funding was obtained from USDA APHIS-PPQ, Farm Bill 10201 and through PICT 1447/2016 awarded by FONCyT Argentina. D.P.M. and N.N.M are recipients of a postdoctoral scholarship awarded by CONICET. E.H. and L.V. are members of Carrera del Investigador CONICET.
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This work was supported by the United States Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service—Plant Protection and Quarantine (USDA APHIS-PPQ), Farm Bill 10201; and by the Fondo para la Investigación Científica y Tecnológica (FONCYT) of Argentina PICT 1447/2016.
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D.P.M., E.H., and L.V., designed the project. D.P.M., E.H., and L.V., performed field collections. D.P.M., conducted molecular work and data analyses. N.N.M., Implemented the automation of demographic simulations. D.P.M drafted the manuscript, E.H and L.V., reviewed and edited the manuscript. All coauthors made contributions to the final version of the manuscript and approved the manuscript submission.
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Poveda-Martínez, D., Moreyra, N.N., Hasson, E. et al. Demographic inference provides evidence of a quaternary-driven impact on the cactus moth and sheds light on the putative role of an exotic host. Biol Invasions (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-024-03317-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-024-03317-2