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Why Did Terrestrial Insect Diversity Not Increase During the Angiosperm Radiation? Mid-Mesozoic, Plant-Associated Insect Lineages Harbor Clues

  • Conrad LabandeiraEmail author
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Abstract

Several studies provided evidence that family-level insect diversity remained flat throughout the initial mid-Cretaceous angiosperm radiation 125–90 million years ago. As this result has engendered considerable commentary, a reanalysis was done of a new dataset of 280 plant-associated insect families spanning the 174 million year interval of the Jurassic–Paleogene periods from 201 to 23 million years ago. Lineage geochronologic ranges were determined, and feeding attributes were characterized by: (i) dominant feeding guild (herbivore, pollinator, herbivore–pollinator, pollinator–mimic, xylophage); (ii) membership in one of eight functional feeding groups; and (iii) dominant plant host or host transition (cryptogam/fern only, cryptogam/fern → angiosperm, gymnosperm only, gymnosperm → angiosperm, angiosperm only). A time-series plot of insect lineages and their dominant plant–host affiliations resulted in four conclusions. First, insect lineages with dominant gymnosperm hosts reached a level of 95 families in the 35 million years preceding the initial angiosperm radiation. Second, earlier insect lineages with gymnosperm → angiosperm host transitions and newly originated insect lineages that developed dominant associations with emerging angiosperms rapidly diversified during the angiosperm radiation, later establishing a plateau of 110 families during a 20 million year interval after the initial angiosperm radiation. Third, these two diversity maxima were separated during the angiosperm radiation by a diversity minimum, the Aptian–Albian gap, indicating major turnover and time-lag effects associated with the extirpation and acquisition of plant associations. Last, insect lineages most affected during this interval were herbivores and pollinators, exophagous feeders, and those hosting gymnosperms, angiosperms and gymnosperm → angiosperm transitions. These data largely explain the flat or even decreased level of insect diversity immediately before, during, and after the initial angiosperm radiation.

Keywords

Aptian–albian gap Cretaceous Feeding guild Fern Functional feeding group Gymnosperm Host–plant preference Plant–insect interactions Stasis Time lags 
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Notes

Acknowledgments

Thanks go to Pierre Pontarotti for inviting CCL to attend the Seventeenth Evolutionary Biology meeting in Marseille France. Finnegan Marsh adroitly crafted the figures. We are grateful for the Missouri Botanical Garden (St. Louis, Missouri), Wang Chen (Capital Normal University, Beijing), and Enrique Peñalver (Museo Geominero, Madrid) for use of images in Fig. 13.4. An anonymous reviewer improved the manuscript. Use of the online Paleobiology Data Base (PBDB) is acknowledged. This is contribution 263 to the Evolution of Terrestrial Ecosystems consortium at the National Museum of Natural History, in Washington, D.C.

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© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Department of PaleobiologyNational Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian InstitutionWashingtonUSA
  2. 2.Department of Entomology and BEES ProgramUniversity of MarylandCollege ParkUSA
  3. 3.College of Life SciencesCapital Normal UniversityBeijingChina

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