Effects of urbanization on specialist insect communities of milkweed are mediated by spatial and temporal variation
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract Urbanization drastically alters landscapes in ways that can threaten local biodiversity. Although species loss has been well documented in urban habitats, why some species persist and not others, and how species interactions change remain poorly understood, especially for species with specialized niche requirements. Here, we test the hypothesis that urbanization disrupts specialized plant–herbivore interactions, and these effects vary according to the characteristics of both cities and the features of the organisms themselves. To test this hypothesis, we surveyed milkweed specialist herbivore communities in the early and late growing season of the common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) across six cities that varied in size by two orders of magnitude. Four results are most important to answering our research questions: (1) the abundance of herbivore species was higher in urban than in rural habitats, whereas leaf herbivory was higher in rural than in urban habitats, and these effects varied between seasons and among cities; (2) the higher species diversity and abundance are likely due to a few species being more associated with rural habitats and other species more common in urban habitats, and thus, urbanization alters insect community composition; (3) the species with the lowest dispersal abilities, Rhyssomatus lineaticollis and Liriomyza asclepiadis, were those that were most strongly affected by urbanization, with R. lineaticollis less abundant and L. asclepiadis more abundant in urban areas; and (4) urbanization influenced plant–herbivore interactions by reducing herbivory, but it did not alter species interactions among herbivorous insects. Biodiversity loss, particularly declines of habitat and host specialists, in urban areas remains a critical concern for conservation. Our results indicate that at least some specialist herbivores are more abundant in urban areas than in rural areas and that species interactions remain intact.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".