Insect herbivores and their parasitoids play a crucial role in terrestrial trophic interactions in tropical forests. These interactions occur across the entire vertical gradient of the forest. This study compares how caterpillar communities, and their parasitism rates, vary across vertical strata and between caterpillar defensive strategies in a tropical forest in Nditam, Cameroon. Caterpillar species richness and diversity peaked in the midstory, while density decreased in the midstory and increased towards the highest strata. This trend was driven by highly dense shelter-building caterpillars in the upper canopy. As height increased, caterpillar generality decreased, vulnerability peaked in the midstory, and connectance increased towards the upper canopy. Both aposematic and shelter-building caterpillars had significantly higher parasitism rates than cryptic caterpillars, suggesting these could be considered a “safe haven” for parasitoids. These results highlight the nuanced changes in caterpillar communities across forest strata and the importance of defense strategies as indicators of parasitism rates.

Finnie, S., Butterill, P., Novotny, V., Redmond, C., Jorge, L. R., Abe, T., … & Sam, K. (2024). Vertical stratification and defensive traits of caterpillars against parasitoids in a lowland tropical forest in Cameroon. Oecologia, 1-16.