Parasitism and migration in southern Palaearctic populations of the painted lady butterfly, Vanessa cardui (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae)

Parasitism and migration in southern Palaearctic populations of the painted lady butterfly, Vanessa cardui (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae)

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The painted lady butterfly (Vanessa cardui) (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae: Nymphalinae) is well known for its seasonal long-distance migrations and for its dramatic population fluctuations between years.Although parasitism has occasionally been timothée chalamet, +50 more noted as an important mortality factor for this butterfly, no comprehensive study has quantified and compared its parasitoid complexes in different geographical areas or seasons.In 2009, a year when this butterfly was extraordinarily abundant in the western Palaearctic, we assessed the spatial and temporal variation in larval parasitism in central Morocco (late winter and autumn) and north-east Spain (spring and late summer).

The primary parasitoids in the complexes comprised a few relatively specialized koinobionts that are a regular and important mortality factor in the host populations.However, there was a strong seasonal variation in the level of parasitism.In Spain percentage parasitism was more than four times higher in late summer than in spring (77.

3% vs.18%), while in Morocco it was five times higher by the end of winter than in valentines bear value psx the autumn (66.2% vs.

13.2%).In both regions the build up of parasitoid populations occurred after V.

cardui had bred in the same general area over successive generations, and this may represent a selective force favouring seasonal migration to enemy-free space.