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Host Feeding by an Herbivore Improves the Performance of Offspring

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Abstract

Herbivores have developed diverse strategies to manipulate host plants for their own benefits. The gall induction by the maize orange leafhopper Cicadulina bipunctata is different from that by other gall-inducing insects in that the galls are induced not on feeding sites but appear on distant, newly developing leaves. In addition, adult C. bipunctata are highly mobile and seldom feed on gall tissue that they have induced. These mean that the gall induction by C. bipunctata is unlikely to contribute to the fitness of the inducer itself. The objective of this study was to determine whether manipulation of the host plant by this leafhopper has a subsequent benefit to offspring. Adults feeding on maize seedlings caused a partial change in the glucose content and a remarkable change in the accumulation of free amino acids in the gall tissue. Increases in emergence and developmental rates were observed in nymphs feeding on gall tissue induced by prior adult feeding. Such improvements were not evident in nymphs feeding on a C. bipunctata-resistant variety, which rarely displays galls after C. bipunctata feeding, nor on maize seedlings previously foraged by another leafhopper, Psammotettix striatus. The results indicate that gall tissue induced by adult C. bipunctata contribute to better performance of its offspring through improvement of the nutritional components of host plants.

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Acknowledgments

We thank K. Abe and R. Yamada for rearing the insects for experiments, S. Kamitani and T. Mita for information about P. striatus, and M. Matsumoto for advice and assistance in amino acid analysis. This study was supported partly by a Grant-in Aid for Scientific Research on Innovative Areas (21200066) from MEXT, Japan and a grant from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries of Japan.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Agro-Environment Research Division, NARO Kyushu Okinawa Agricultural Research Center, Suya 2421, Kumamoto, Koshi, Japan

    Keiichiro Matsukura & Masaya Matsumura

  2. Laboratory of System Ecology, Faculty of Agriculture, Saga University, Saga, Japan

    Makoto Tokuda

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  1. Keiichiro Matsukura
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  2. Masaya Matsumura
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  3. Makoto Tokuda
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Correspondence to Keiichiro Matsukura.

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Matsukura, K., Matsumura, M. & Tokuda, M. Host Feeding by an Herbivore Improves the Performance of Offspring. Evol Biol 39, 341–347 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11692-011-9150-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11692-011-9150-7

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