| Background/Question/Methods: A time series of Lepidoptera larvae (caterpillar) abundance and biomass in the northern hardwood forests of central New Hampshire, USA, shows large interannual fluctuations in aggregated caterpillar biomass (52-fold variation in mg caterpillars/ 8000 leaves) that were spatially correlated across a regional landscape. Primary production of these mature forests has not varied over this period, and many hundreds of Lepidoptera species share comparatively few host plants. Therefore, interannual changes in nutritional quality of even one host plant species may be capable of generating correlated population dynamics for many species in the Lepidoptera community. We tested the hypothesis that variation in soil nutrient availability... |
