| Abstract | Abstract: Insect phenology defines the nexus of climate and population dynamics. Thermal effects on development are generally non-linear and stage-specific, creating bottlenecks in the developmental program that determine not only the timing but the synchrony of cohort emergence. In turn, synchrony affects realized spatiotemporal density, providing a mechanistic link between climate and density-dependence and a means for approaching problems associated with species range limits or outbreaks. These ideas are explored in two mass-attacking species, the southern pine beetle and the mountain pine beetle using a stochastic differential equation approach to ecophysiological modeling that captures basic demographic rates as well threshold attack densities. While the two species have similar requirements for success at the scale of a single host, their phonological differences lead to an interesting divergence in the role of climate in population dynamics. |
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