Investigating Herbivore Relationships to Boechera stricta in a Climate Change Context.
Abstract
Boechera stricta is a mustard that grows naturally throughout a wide range of altitudes in the Colorado Rocky Mountains. B. stricta has a variety of natural herbivores, which makes it an interesting system in which to study how plant-herbivore relationships vary over an elevational gradient. Through this study we begin to characterize the relationships between Boechera stricta and its surrounding insect herbivore community. We sampled the insect community surrounding B. stricta in a collection of quadrats, and analyzed how the diversity and abundance of these insects varied across an elevational gradient. We analyzed the insect community as a whole, and conducted with more pointed analyses focusing on insects in taxonomical groupings known to herbivorize plants. Other variables affecting insect diversity were also taken into account such as the density of plant cover at each site. We found that insect diversity decreases as elevation increases, and that insect diversity increases as plant cover density increases as well. This study has laid important groundwork for future studies on herbivore-B. stricta relationships in the context of climate change.
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