Description
The forest–tundra ecotone, which spans the whole northern Hemisphere, is the zone where closed forests gradually give way to open arctic or alpine tundra. In northern Norway, the forest–tundra ecotone is formed by three main vegetation types: (1) subarctic forests, where the canopy layer is formed almost exclusively by mountain birch; (2) a transitional zone of tall-shrub tundra dominated by diverse willow species in various combinations; and (3) arctic and alpine tundra, with low vegetation consisting of dwarf shrubs, herbs, grasses, mosses, and lichens. During the coming decades, the distributions of the different habitat types within the forest–tundra ecotone will change dramatically as a result of the warming climate. Especially open tundra habitats will shrink from their current extent due to shrub expansion. This may lead to significant losses of vertebrate and invertebrate species in open tundra habitats, but also of species living within other components of the forest–tundra ecotone. Predicting the effects of climate change requires detailed information on current diversity as well as the habitat and niche requirements of individual species. In our project, we use DNA barcodes to identify and to infer niches of insect species in different habitats within the forest–tundra ecotone. The first part of our project concentrates on the most important groups of plant-feeding insects in the north: butterflies and moths, symphytan hymenopterans (sawflies), beetles, leaf-mining flies, and hyperdiverse gall midges. In particular, we aim to barcode larvae collected directly from identified host plants, because the host plants determine the habitat(s) in which a given insect species can survive. In our second main line of investigation, we barcode hymenopteran and dipteran parasitoids reared from the herbivore larvae. Parasitoids are known to be hyperdiverse in subarctic and arctic environments, but are extremely difficult to identify based on morphological traits. Parasitoids constitute the main source of mortality for the larvae of other insects, so understanding parasitoid species richness and community composition in the forest–tundra ecotone will, for example, help to understand the regulation of moth outbreaks in mountain birch forests. Our barcoding project provides information on insect diversity in different habitats within the northern forest–tundra ecotone, provides genetic tools and reference databases for ongoing and planned environmental monitoring efforts, and results in data that can be used to estimate the threats that specific insect species, taxa, and communities face because of the warming climate of the future.
Data Records
The data in this occurrence resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 783 records.
This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.
Versions
The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.
How to cite
Researchers should cite this work as follows:
Nyman, T. 2023. Insects of the forest-tundra-ecotone (ForTunE).
Rights
Researchers should respect the following rights statement:
The publisher and rights holder of this work is Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License.
GBIF Registration
This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: 83bf1012-38d7-4260-8d3a-866516c65c82. Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by GBIF Norway.
Keywords
Arctic; herbivore; parasitoid; plant-herbivore-parasitoid networks; pollinators; Salix; Norway; Chalcidoidea; Ichneumonoidea; Egle; Cecidomyiidae
Contacts
- Originator ●
- Point Of Contact
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2061-0570
Geographic Coverage
Northern and eastern Finnmark in Norway
| Bounding Coordinates | South West [69.157, 28.49], North East [70.584, 30.795] |
|---|
Taxonomic Coverage
N/A
| Kingdom | Animalia |
|---|---|
| Phylum | Arthropoda |
| Class | Insecta |
| Order | Diptera |
| Family | Anthomyiidae |
Project Data
The forest–tundra ecotone, which spans the whole northern Hemisphere, is the zone where closed forests gradually give way to open arctic or alpine tundra. In northern Norway, the forest–tundra ecotone is formed by three main vegetation types: (1) subarctic forests, where the canopy layer is formed almost exclusively by mountain birch; (2) a transitional zone of tall-shrub tundra dominated by diverse willow species in various combinations; and (3) arctic and alpine tundra, with low vegetation consisting of dwarf shrubs, herbs, grasses, mosses, and lichens. During the coming decades, the distributions of the different habitat types within the forest–tundra ecotone will change dramatically as a result of the warming climate. Especially open tundra habitats will shrink from their current extent due to shrub expansion. This may lead to significant losses of vertebrate and invertebrate species in open tundra habitats, but also of species living within other components of the forest–tundra ecotone. Predicting the effects of climate change requires detailed information on current diversity as well as the habitat and niche requirements of individual species. In our project, we use DNA barcodes to identify and to infer niches of insect species in different habitats within the forest–tundra ecotone. The first part of our project concentrates on the most important groups of plant-feeding insects in the north: butterflies and moths, symphytan hymenopterans (sawflies), beetles, leaf-mining flies, and hyperdiverse gall midges. In particular, we aim to barcode larvae collected directly from identified host plants, because the host plants determine the habitat(s) in which a given insect species can survive. In our second main line of investigation, we barcode hymenopteran and dipteran parasitoids reared from the herbivore larvae. Parasitoids are known to be hyperdiverse in subarctic and arctic environments, but are extremely difficult to identify based on morphological traits. Parasitoids constitute the main source of mortality for the larvae of other insects, so understanding parasitoid species richness and community composition in the forest–tundra ecotone will, for example, help to understand the regulation of moth outbreaks in mountain birch forests. Our barcoding project provides information on insect diversity in different habitats within the northern forest–tundra ecotone, provides genetic tools and reference databases for ongoing and planned environmental monitoring efforts, and results in data that can be used to estimate the threats that specific insect species, taxa, and communities face because of the warming climate of the future.
| Title | Insects of the Forest-Tundra Ecotone |
|---|---|
| Identifier | Artsprosjekt_27-19_ForTunE |
| Funding | Artsdatabanken (project 27-19) |
| Study Area Description | Northern and Eastern Finnmark, Norway |
The personnel involved in the project:
- Content Provider
- Content Provider
- Content Provider
- Content Provider
- Content Provider
- Owner
Sampling Methods
(1) Insects reared from Salix catkins and galls (2) Insects collected from flowers of Rubus chamaemorus and Salix species (3) Material from Malaise traps (4) Observations of Salix species
| Study Extent | Insects and plants of Northern and Eastern Finnmark, Norway |
|---|
Method step description:
- Collecting, rearing, sorting, identification, DNA barcoding
Collection Data
| Collection Name | NIBIO Svanhovd Biobank |
|---|
| Specimen preservation methods | Alcohol |
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Additional Metadata
| Alternative Identifiers | 83bf1012-38d7-4260-8d3a-866516c65c82 |
|---|---|
| https://ipt.gbif.no/resource?r=artsprosjekt_27-19_fortune |