Raw data for the analysis carried out in the article: Differential responses of body resource allocations of the parasitoid Cotesia flavipes (Hymenoptera, Braconidae) populations to altitude

Description

Living at high altitudes impose physiological and ecological challenges where species may show changes in their body size, proportions, and shape. Despite the importance of this topic for understanding the origin of diversity, little attention has been invested in this phenomenon at the populational level. This dataset aims to study the relationship between altitude and body size, body proportions, and forewing shape venation of two populations of the parasitoid wasp Cotesia flavipes. Wasps were collected from Diatraea spp larvae from sugarcane crops in two Colombian mountain ranges between 600 m and 2143 m altitude. Linear measurements of different body regions and geometric morphometrics of the forewing were subject to multivariate comparisons and allometric analyses to assess variation and to compare trends between ranges. Central and Eastern Cordillera populations showed opposite trends in their relationships between body size and altitude. Allometric trends were not uniform within and between populations and between structures. The data from the single altitude suggested that the trends within cordilleras and the differences between them were a consequence of altitude and not the result of intrinsic body resource allocation processes. Wing shape between populations differed; however, these changes were poorly related to altitude. It is possible that the differences and patterns from our study resulted from plasticity; but even so, it could be evolutionarily significant as these responses could be selectively important, posteriorly promoting genetic differentiation.

Steps to reproduce

Mesosoma length and height, first metasomal tergite apical and proximal width, forewing length, and hind tibia length were measured for each wasp. Average of three repetitions per measurement were used. Repeatability was calculated following Bayle and Byrnes (1990), and 15 missing data from 10 individuals were estimated with Bayesian PCA estimator, using pcaMethods package in R. Normality was assessed by a Shapiro-Wilk test. Cluster analyses and principal component analyses were used to assess the general distribution of variation and to identify the measurement that better described size. Individuals were compared by mountain range using a non-parametric Manova with the package vegan of R. To evaluate individuals belonging to either mountain range we applied discriminant analysis using the MASS package in R. Data were normalized with a Box-Cox transformation with the software PAST. Only females were used. Body size variation along altitude was assessed by linear regressions. To evaluate if the altitudinal variation was associated with resource allocation of different body parts, allometric analyses with standardized major axes implemented in the package Smatr of R were applied to each mountain range. Variables were log-10 transformed. A similar analysis was conducted to a single altitude (934 m) of the Central Cordillera. For geometric morphometric analyses, we used the forewings of 162 individuals. Thirteen landmarks placed at veins and pterostigma intersections were selected and their coordinates were obtained in TPSDig2 software. A general procrustes analysis was conducted in MorphoJ. Outlier data were identified by comparing the Mahalanobis distance. We used the relative warps as quantitative shape variables for multivariate regression analyses. Relative warp values came from the relative warp scores matrix generated by the tpsRelw software. Allometric effects on shape were evaluated by multivariate regression of relative warps on log-transformed body size descriptor measurement. The effect of uneven landmark distances along the wing configuration was studied by comparing results of removing landmarks 8, 10, 11 and 12 from analyses, with those where all landmarks were included. Forewing shape differences regarding mountain range were assessed by a canonical variate analysis. We assessed the relationship between altitude and forewing shape for each cordillera population through multivariate linear regression and through polynomial third grade regressions. We used the first relative warp of wing shape to describe nonlinear relationships between variables. The sample from 877 m altitude on the Eastern cordillera was excluded since it included only a single female available for the analysis. Deformation grids were generated with the software tpsSpline using consensus configurations from each mountain range.

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