Increasing numbers of phylogeographic studies make comparative inferences about the histories of co-distributed species. Although the aims of such studies are best achieved by jointly analysing sequences from multiple loci in a model-based framework, such data currently exist for few nonmodel systems. We used existing genomic data and expressed sequence tags (ESTs) for Hymenoptera and other ins...

Two general hypotheses that describe the relationship between plant quality and host-plant preference of insect herbivores are the plant-stress and plant-vigor hypotheses. We examined the response of a gall-forming guild of insect herbivores associated with prairie rose, Rosa arkansana Porter (Rosaceae), to experimental manipulations of plant stress (addition of NaCl) and vigor (addition of nit...

Live oak (Quercus virginiana Mill.) trees are hosts to a complex of gall making arthropods. However, the bullet galls produced by the asexual generation of the cynipid Disholcaspis quercuscirens (Ashmead) can esthetically and physically damage nursery and street trees, and thus reduce tree value. We sought to describe the unknown sexual generation of D. quercusvirens, describe the development o...