昆虫个体大小对其种群生物学的影响

个体大小是昆虫种群最直观的表型之一。很多研究发现,个体大小可对昆虫的许多生物学特性产生影响,由此影响昆虫种群的发展以及所在群落的结构和功能。根据最近20多年的相关文献,综述了个体大小对种群以下几方面的影响:成虫求偶、交配、生殖力及后代适合度,飞行及与飞行相关的其他行为如觅食、空中求偶和交配,摄食能力和食料种类,竞争和防御能力,抗逆性,以及社会性昆虫的劳动分工等。通常情况下,与同种内较小个体相比,较大的昆虫在生殖、飞行、抗逆性等方面往往具有优势,有助于种群适合度的提高。最后提出了几点可供此领域研究参考的建议和应用启示。

Effects of body size on the population biology of insects

Body size is one of the most important life-history traits of insects. As demonstrated in numerous studies, insect body size can have substantial effects on a number of biological characters, which in turn may influence population development as well as community structure and functions. In this paper, based on the studies published in the past two decades, we reviewed the major findings in this field, and focused on the effects of body size on following traits:1) courtship, mating, fecundity of females and males, and fitness of their offspring; 2) flight performance, and the relevant behaviors such as foraging, aerial courting and mating; 3) food-uptake capacity and the type of preferred diets; 4) competition and defense capacity; 5) resistance to environment stress; and 6) labor division in social insects. In most cases, larger individuals are superior to small ones in certain aspects, reproduction, flight and adaptation to adverse environments in particular, which subsequently favors the increase of population fitness. We presented some viewpoints as to future studies, such as taking more biological traits into consideration when evaluating associations between body size and insect reproduction, and paying more attention on the ecological results of body size variance at the community level. From the practical perspective, it is suggested to take body size into account when developing insect-pest control or beneficial-insect utilization strategies.