Monday, 18 November 2002
D0117

This presentation is part of : Student Competition Display Presentations, Subsection Cd. Behavior and Ecology

Variation on plant substrates and its consequences for the study of insect vibrational communication

Reginald B. Cocroft, Holly J. Shugart, Katie Konrad, and Krystall Tibbs. Unviversity of Missouri - Columbia, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, 105 Tucker Hall, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO

Communication through plant-borne vibrations is common among insects and other arthropods. However, plant stems and leaves provide a heterogeneous transmission channel for vibrational signals. Signals may be filtered, sometimes severely, and they may also be distorted by reflections and by the dispersive propagation of bending waves in stems. This filtering creates challenges both for the communicating animals, which will encounter an unpredictable transmission channel, and for human observers, who may wish to characterize signals at an individual, population, or species level. We used an insect model (the treehopper Umbonia crassicornis) to quantify the effect of variation in the plant substrate on vibrational signals. We recorded individuals on multiple substrates using a repeated measures design that incorporated variation within and between plant species. As expected, the frequency spectra of signals were substrate-dependent. However, other features (especially temporal features) were highly repeatable. We discuss the consequences of substrate-dependent signal variation both as a challenge for communicating animals and as a challenge for comparison of signals recorded on different substrates.



Species 1: Homoptera Membracidae Umbonia crassicornis (thornbug, treehoppers)
Keywords: vibrational communication, plant effects

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