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High floral resource density leads to neural constraint in the generalist, floriphilic katydid, P haneroptera brevis ( O rthoptera: P haneropterinae)
Author(s) -
TAN MING KAI,
LEEM CHERYL J. M.,
TAN HUGH T. W.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
ecological entomology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.865
H-Index - 81
eISSN - 1365-2311
pISSN - 0307-6946
DOI - 10.1111/een.12414
Subject(s) - biology , context (archaeology) , resource (disambiguation) , foraging , constraint (computer aided design) , generalist and specialist species , ecology , habitat , computer science , mathematics , paleontology , computer network , geometry
1. The neural constraint hypothesis has been investigated in the field of insect–plant interactions. It predicts that the consumer's detection ability, time spent on resources, and efficiency in resource use are affected by different aspects of resource availability. 2. The applicability of this hypothesis in florivory, however, generally lacks a mechanistic understanding of the effect of resource density on neural constraint, so using caged experiments, the (i) ability of a generalist, floriphilic katydid [( P haneroptera brevis (Serville)] to find a floral resource (inflorescences of B idens pilosa L.), (ii) attentiveness of the katydid on this resource after successfully detecting the floral resource, and (iii) efficiency of resource use under varying densities of the floral resource were studied. 3. The present results indicated no evidence of an obvious effect of floral resource density on the detection of resources by the florivore but an increase in floral‐resource density generally led to lower efficiency and attentiveness in the foraging katydids. 4. These findings provide the first evidence of the neural constraint hypothesis in the context of resource density and corroborate the applicability of the neural constraint hypothesis in florivory.