Plants, Chemicals, and Insects: Some Aspects of Coevolution

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Abstract
The coevolution of the Insecta with the plant kingdom provides an important area of investigation for both basic and applied research in entomology. The relatively enormous numbers of species involved, perhaps some 500,000 insects and 200,000 plants and the vast expanse of more than 300 million years of evolutionary time concerned, serve not only to provide virtually limitless examples of relationships for study but also have obscured many of the key interrelationships in the mists of time. According La Smart and Hughes (1973), the first land plants appeared about 420 M yr BP in the Devonian period and the first flowering plants occurred about 225 M yr BP in the Triassic. These were followed by the development of fruits in the Cretaceous little more than 100 M yr BP. This segment of evolutionary time was overlapped by the evolution of insects which emerged about 300 M yr BP in the Carboniferous and were well diversified into modern orders by the Permean 270 Myr BP (CSIRO 1970). The first fossil records of insect damaged leaves are found in the Permian about 270 M yr BP.

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