Abstract
Ascia monuste orseis Godart (Lepidoptera: Pieridae) is a neotropical butterfly distributed in South America. During the larval stage, this insect causes economic losses on Brassica crops. Wet and warm conditions are known to increase subspecies occurrence, but it remains unclear why these conditions are more suitable. In this study, we have shown that both conditions are highly favourable for A. monuste orseis. We determined the thermal requirements for immature development and then created models for A. monuste orseis occurrence using Climex algorithm. Two models were built: one for the year-round presence and other for seasonal suitability. We validated the models using subspecies occurrence records and monitoring in two Brazilian regions (Northeast and Southeast). The minimum, optimum and maximum temperature for immature development were estimated at 16.37, 29.16 and 34.95 °C, respectively. The model for year-round presence indicated tropical areas as highly suitable for A. monuste orseis occurrence (with 88% of accuracy) and the seasonal models showed unsuitable areas in some parts of South America during cold and dry periods. Such predictions were observed in the monitored areas where A. monuste orseis was not found. These results can be associated with the mortality caused by low temperature to immature stages and drought conditions that may induce adult migration to moist habitats. Thus, we suggest that A. monuste orseis occurs mainly during wet and warm seasons on Brassica crops due to deleterious effects caused by cold and dry conditions. This information can be used to improve A. monuste orseis management in Brassica crops.
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
Data that support the findings of this study are openly available in the online version of this paper.
References
Alvares CA, Stape JL, Sentelhas PC, de Moraes Gonçalves JL, Sparovek G (2013) Köppen’s climate classification map for Brazil. Meteorol Z 22:711–728. https://doi.org/10.1127/0941-2948/2013/0507
Bates D, Maechler M, Bolker B, Walker S (2015) Fitting linear mixed-effects using lme4. J Stat Softw 67:1–48. https://doi.org/10.18637/jss.v067.i01
Bonebrake TC, Ponisio LC, Boggs CL, Ehrlich PR (2010) More than just indicators: a review of tropical butterfly ecology and conservation. Biol Conserv 143:1831–1841. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2010.04.044
Braby MF (1995) Reproductive seasonality in tropical satyrine butterflies: strategies for the dry season. Ecol Entomol 20:5–17. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2311.1995.tb00423.x
Checa MF, Rodriguez J, Willmott KR, Liger B (2014) Microclimate variability significantly affects the composition, abundance and phenology of butterfly communities in a highly threatened neotropical dry forest. Fla Entomol 97:1–13. https://doi.org/10.1653/024.097.0101
Da Silva RS, Kumar L, Shabani F et al (2018) Dry stress decreases areas suitable for Neoleucinodes elegantalis (Lepidoptera: Crambidae) and affects its survival under climate predictions in South America. Ecol Inform 46:103–113. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoinf.2018.06.003
Farias ES, Santos AA, Ribeiro AV, Carmo DG, Paes JS, Picanço MC (2020) Climate and host plants mediating seasonal dynamics and within-plant distribution of the diamondback moth (Plutella xylostella). Crop Prot 134:105172. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cropro.2020.105172
Fischer K, Dierks A, Franke K, Geister TL, Liszka M, Winter S, Pflicke C (2010) Environmental effects on temperature stress resistance in the tropical butterfly Bicyclus anynana. PLoS One 5:e15284. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0015284
Franklin J (2010) Mapping species distributions: spatial inference and prediction. Cambrige University Press, New York
Jones RE, Rienks J (1987) Reproductive seasonality in the tropical genus Eurema (Lepidoptera: Pieridae). Biotropica 19:7–16. https://doi.org/10.2307/2388454
Kriticos DJ, Maywald GF, Yonow T et al (2015) Climex version 4: exploring the effects of climate on plants, animals and diseases. CSIRO, Canberra
Liu TX (2005) Biology and life history of Ascia monuste monuste (Lepidoptera: Pieridae), a potential pest of cruciferous vegetables. Ann Entomol Soc Am 98:726–731. https://doi.org/10.1603/0013-8746(2005)098%5B0726:BALHOA%5D2.0.CO;2
Martins JC, Picanço MC, Bacci L, Guedes RNC, Santana PA Jr, Ferreira DO, Chediak M (2016) Life table determination of thermal requirements of the tomato borer Tuta absoluta. J Pest Sci 89:897–908. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10340-016-0729-8
Melo DHA, Duarte M, Mielke OHH, Robbins RK, Freitas AVL (2019) Butterflies (Lepidoptera: Papilionoidea) of an urban park in Northeastern Brazil. Biota Neotrop 19:e20180614. https://doi.org/10.1590/1676-0611-bn-2018-0614
Nagelkerke N (1991) A note on a general definition of the coefficient of determination. Biometrika 78:691–692. https://doi.org/10.1093/biomet/78.3.691
Nielsen ET, Nielsen HT (1959) Temperatures preferred by the Pierid Ascia monuste L. Ecology 40:181–185. https://doi.org/10.2307/1930027
Peel MC, Finlayson BL, Mcmahon TA (2007) Updated world map of the Köppen-Geiger climate classification. Hydrol Earth Syst Sci 11:1633–1644
Picanço MC, De Oliveira IR, Rosado JF et al (2010) Natural biological control of Ascia monuste by the social wasp Polybia ignobilis. Sociobiology 56:67–76
Poffo DA, Beccacece HM, Caranti GM, Comes RA, Drewniak ME, Martina A, Zapata AI, Rodriguez A, Saffe JN (2018) Migration monitoring of Ascia monuste (Lepidoptera) and Schistocerca cancellata (Orthoptera) in Argentina using RMA1 weather radar. ISPRS J Photogramm 145:340–348. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isprsjprs.2018.05.011
Pollard E (1988) Temperature, rainfall and butterfly numbers. J Appl Ecol 25:819–828. https://doi.org/10.2307/2403748
R Core Team (2018) R: A language and environment for statistical. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna
Ramos RS, Kumar L, Shabani F, da Silva RS, de Araújo TA, Picanço MC (2019) Climate model for seasonal variation in Bemisia tabaci using CLIMEX in tomato crops. Int J Biometeorol 63:281–291. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00484-018-01661-2
Santana AFK, Rodrigues D, Zucoloto FS (2017) Larval aggregation in a Neotropical butterfly: risky behaviors, per capita risk, and larval responses in Ascia monuste orseis. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 71:1–10. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-017-2403-4
Santos AA, Hogendoorn K, Ramos RS, Picanço MC (2019) Distribution models for Ascia monuste and the host Brassica oleracea var. capitata. J Appl Entomol 143:1043–1051. https://doi.org/10.1111/jen.12675
Shahabuddin G, Terborgh JW (1999) Frugivorous butterflies in Venezuelan forest fragments: abundance, diversity and the effects of isolation. J Trop Ecol 15:703–722. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0266467499001121
Sutcliffe OL, Thomas CD, Moss D (1996) Spatial synchrony and asynchrony in butterfly population dynamics. J Anim Ecol 65:85–95. https://doi.org/10.2307/5702
Thiele SC, Milcharek O, dos Santos FL, Kaminski LA (2014) Butterflies (Lepidoptera: Hesperioidea and Papilionoidea) of Porto Mauá, Upper Paraná Atlantic Forest Ecoregion, Rio Grande do Sul State, Brazil. Biota Neotrop 14:1–10. https://doi.org/10.1590/1676-06032014000613
Walter JA, Sheppard LW, Venugopal PD, Reuman DC, Dively G, Tooker JF, Johnson DM (2019) Weather and regional crop composition variation drive spatial synchrony of lepidopteran agricultural pests. Ecol Entomol 45:1–10. https://doi.org/10.1111/een.12830
Wickham H (2016) ggplot2: elegant graphics for data analysis. Springer-Verlag, New York
Acknowledgements
We appreciate the help provided by our colleagues from the Integrated Pest Management Laboratory at Federal University of Viçosa and Federal University of Sergipe during field sampling. Many thanks to the farmers for allowing us sampling the brassica crops. AAS thanks João Silva and Dr. Rodrigo Ramos for their help with Climex software and Mr. José Evaristo for assistance in A. monuste orseis rearing.
Funding
This research was supported by ‘Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico’ (CNPq, Grant number 142410/2017-9) and ‘Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior’ (CAPES, Grant number 001).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
AAS and MCP conceived the research. AAS, DGC and RCS conducted the thermal requirement experiments. AVR and MCP analyzed thermal requirement experiment. AAS created Climex models. AAS, EGF and LB performed field evaluation. AAS wrote the first manuscript version. AVR and ESF edited and made critical reviews. All authors read and approved the final version of the manuscript.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Electronic supplementary material
ESM 1
(DOCX 55 kb)
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Santos, A.A., Ribeiro, A.V., Farias, E.S. et al. Wet and warm conditions contribute to the occurrence of the neotropical butterfly Ascia monuste orseis Godart (Lepidoptera: Pieridae) on Brassica crops. Int J Biometeorol 65, 247–256 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00484-020-02026-4
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00484-020-02026-4