Plant Allelochemicals, Tritrophic Interactions and the Anomalous Diversity of Tropical Parasitoids: The "Nasty" Host Hypothesis
- 1 November 1992
- Vol. 65 (2) , 353-357
- https://doi.org/10.2307/3545032
Abstract
The number of species in many groups of parasitoid Hymenoptera does not increase rapidly with decreasing latitude. Discussion of the processes generating this pattern has focussed upon changes in host demographic traits and upon the effect of seasonality. Here we advance a further and compatible hypothesis, that tropical parasitoid hosts are less available to parasitoids than are extra-tropical hosts because their tissues are, on average, more chemically toxic than are the tissues or extra-tropical hosts. There is some evidence that suggests that tropical woody plants are, in general. richer in toxic secondary compounds than are extra-tropical species, and evidence exists to demonstrate that these allelochemicals may have adverse effects on parasitoids attacking phytophagous insects feeding on such plants.This publication has 2 references indexed in Scilit:
- Evolutionary patterns of host utilization by ichneumonoid parasitoids (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae and Braconidae)*Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 1988
- Alkaloid-Bearing Plants: An Ecogeographic PerspectiveThe American Naturalist, 1976