Long-term phenological trends, species accumulation rates, aphid traits and climate: five decades of change in migrating aphids

Aphids represent a significant challenge to food production. The Rothamsted Insect Survey (RIS) runs a network of 12·2-m suction-traps throughout the year to collect migrating aphids. In 2014, the RIS celebrated its 50th anniversary. This paper marks that achievement with an extensive spatiotemporal analysis and the provision of the first British annotated checklist of aphids since 1964. Our main aim was to elucidate mechanisms that advance aphid phenology under climate change and explain these using life-history traits. We then highlight emerging pests using accumulation patterns. Linear and nonlinear mixed-effect models estimated the average rate of change per annum and effects of climate on annual counts, first and last flights and length of flight season since 1965. Two climate drivers were used: the accumulated day degrees above 16 °C (ADD16) indicated the potential for migration during the aphid season; the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) signalled the severity of the winter before migration took place. All 55 species studied had earlier first flight trends at rate of β = -0·611 ± SE 0·015 days year(-1). Of these species, 49% had earlier last flights, but the average species effect appeared relatively stationary (β = -0·010 ± SE 0·022 days year(-1)). Most species (85%) showed increasing duration of their flight season (β = 0·336 ± SE 0·026 days year(-1)), even though only 54% increased their log annual count (β = 0·002 ± SE <0·001 year(-1)). The ADD16 and NAO were shown to drive patterns in aphid phenology in a spatiotemporal context. Early in the year when the first aphids were migrating, the effect of the winter NAO was highly significant. Further into the year, ADD16 was a strong predictor. Latitude had a near linear effect on first flights, whereas longitude produced a generally less-clear effect on all responses. Aphids that are anholocyclic (permanently parthenogenetic) or are monoecious (non-host-alternating) were advancing their phenology faster than those that were not. Climate drives phenology and traits help explain how this takes place biologically. Phenology and trait ecology are critical to understanding the threat posed by emerging pests such as Myzus persicae nicotianae and Aphis fabae cirsiiacanthoidis, as revealed by the species accumulation analysis.

Cereal aphid movement: general principles and simulation modelling

Cereal aphids continue to be an important agricultural pest, with complex lifecycle and dispersal behaviours. Spatially-explicit models that are able to simulate flight initiation, movement direction, distance and timing of arrival of key aphid species can be highly valuable to area-wide pest management programmes. Here I present an overview of how knowledge about cereal aphid flight and migration can be utilized by mechanistic simulation models. This article identifies specific gaps in knowledge for researchers who may wish to further scientific understanding of aphid flight behaviour, whilst at the same time provides a synopsis of the knowledge requirements for a mechanistic approach applicable to the simulation of a wide range of insect species. Although they are one of the most comprehensively studied insect groups in entomology, it is only recently that our understanding of cereal aphid flight and migration has been translated effectively into spatially-explicit simulation models. There are now a multitude of examples available in the literature for modelling methods that address each of the four phases of the aerial transportation process (uplift, transport in the atmosphere, initial distribution, and subsequent movement). I believe it should now be possible to draw together this knowledgebase and the range of modelling methods available to simulate the entire process: integrating mechanistic simulations that estimate the initiation of migration events, with the large scale migration modelling of cereal aphids and their subsequent local movement.

Dynamics of Production of Sexual Forms in Aphids: Theoretical and Experimental Evidence for Adaptive “Coin‐Flipping” Plasticity

The best strategy for an organism to deal with unpredictable environmental conditions is a stochastic one, but it is not easy to distinguish it from nonadaptive randomness in phenotype production, and its convincing demonstrations are lacking. Here we describe a new method for detection of adaptive stochastic polyphenism and apply it to the following problem. In fall, each female of the bird cherry-oat aphid, Rhopalosiphum padi, faces a decision either to produce sexuals, which mate and lay cold-tolerant eggs, or to continue production of cold-sensitive parthenogenetic females, which potentially yields a higher population growth rate but is risky because a cold winter can kill all of her descendants. Using a simulation model, we show that global investment in sexual reproduction should be proportional to winter severity and that variance in the peak date of production of sexual individuals should depend on climate predictability. Both predictions are validated against standardized trap data on aphid flight accompanied by meteorological data, and the predictions support adaptive phenotypic plasticity.

Geographic and microgeographic genetic differentiation in two aphid species over southern England using the multilocus (GATA)4 probe

Samples of the grain aphid Sitobion avenae (F.) and the rose-grain aphid Metopolophium dirhodum (Walker) were collected in late March from wheat fields and adjacent road-side grasses at a number of locations in southern England. Unparasitized aphids were DNA fingerprinted using the multilocus (GATA)4 probe. Over all locations, the fingerprints of individual S. avenae caught in wheat had lower overall average distances of band migration (ADBM) and shared a higher proportion of bands, than fingerprints of individuals caught in adjacent road-side grasses. The ADBM of fingerprints of S. avenae collected on road-side grasses altered significantly with geographical location, while the ADBM of fingerprints of S. avenae caught on wheat did not. A comparison of the fingerprints of individual M. dirhodum caught in wheat and neighbouring road-side grasses did not reveal any genetic differentiation. Fingerprints of M. dirhodum that were caught in the same host type did however, show significant variation in ADBM between different locations. With both S. avenae and M. dirhodum, spatial autocorrelation revealed that locations that were close together were no more likely to have individuals with similar ADBM than locations that were far apart. Our results suggest that (i) particular clones of S. avenae prefer to colonize wheat, and/or that (ii) particular clones of S. avenae perform better on wheat than other clones. It is unclear why M. dirhodum did not show any genetic structuring according to host type, but this species appears to engage in sexual reproduction much more frequently than S. avenae in southern England.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)