Costs of plant defense priming: exposure to volatile cues from a specialist herbivore increases short-term growth but reduces rhizome production in tall goldenrod (Solidago altissima).

ABSTRACT:

Background

By sensing environmental cues indicative of pathogens or herbivores, plants can "prime" appropriate defenses and deploy faster, stronger responses to subsequent attack. Such priming presumably entails costs-else the primed state should be constitutively expressed-yet those costs remain poorly documented, in part due to a lack of studies conducted under realistic ecological conditions. We explored how defence priming in goldenrod (Solidago altissima) influenced growth and reproduction under semi-natural field conditions by manipulating exposure to priming cues (volatile emissions of a specialist herbivore, Eurosta solidaginis), competition between neighbouring plants, and herbivory (via insecticide application).

Results

We found that primed plants grew faster than

SUBMITTER: Yip EC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6528222 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature