ASIAN
MYRMECOLOGY

online first (online version of paper published before print issue)

DOI: 10.20362/am.014002
Asian Myrmecology 14: e014001 (1-16)
article first published online: 20/March/2021

Protection from herbivores varies among ant genera for the myrmecophilic plant Leea aculeata in Malaysian Borneo

HANNAH F. BURGER¹*, KAMILA VONDRÁČKOVÁ², MATEUSZ SKŁODOWSKI³, QIAN-QUN KOID⁴, DAISY H. DENT^{5, 6}, KEVIN WALLACE⁷ and TOM M. FAYLE^{4, 8}

Abstract:

Some plants use food bodies to attract ants that then provide protection from herbivory. A brief report from 1898 describes the myrmecophilic plant Leea aculeata Bl. as bearing food bodies on its young shoots, which accumulate when they are not harvested by ants. However, ant efficacy in deterring herbivores and consequences for herbivory rates remain unknown. Here we investigate (1) which ant taxa patrol these plants and whether they remove significant numbers of food bodies, (2) if these ants attack herbivores, and (3) if any anti-herbivore activity correlates negatively with herbivory. We found that a diverse community of ants patrolled young L. aculeata shoots and removed food bodies (1.2 food body per cm2 per 24 h), with food bodies accumulating when ants are experimentally excluded. Attack rates on surrogate herbivores (termite baits) differed among ant genera, with Crematogaster and Lophomyrmex being most active. Although herbivory did not differ among ant genera, herbivory was greater when ants took a longer time to detect herbivores and recruit fellow ants, providing evidence for the mutualism of L. aculeata with ants. However, the variation in protection among ant genera raises questions regarding the stability of this mutualism in the face of exploitation by ants.

Keywords:

myrmecophily; mutualism; food bodies; herbivory; myrmecophily; mutualism; food bodies; herbivory; Leea

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¹Department of Biology, Lund University, Sölvegatan 37, 223 62 Lund, Sweden

²School of Biological Sciences, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen AB24 3FX, UK

³Botanic Garden, Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw, al. Ujazdowskie 4, 00-478 Warszawa, Poland

⁴Institute for Tropical Biology and Conservation, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, 88400 Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia

⁵Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK

⁶Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Luis Clement Avenue, Bldg. 401 Tupper, Balboa Ancon, Panama

⁷Tropical Biology Association, Pembroke Street, Cambridge CB2 3QZ, UK

⁸Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Institute of Entomology, Branišovská 1160/31, 370 05 České Budějovice, Czech Republic

*Corresponding author: hannahfburger@gmail.com