Interspecific hybridization in insects in times of climate change

Abstract

Abstract Climate change can result in species to shift their distributions and thus, increasing current parapatric distributions or entering into secondary contact with phylogenetically related species. Despite widespread evidence of climate-induced range shifts, the short- and long-term consequences of these shifts for species that are parapatric or newly sympatric after evolving in allopatry are not clear. For parapatric species, one possible consequence is the alteration of the established equilibrium of a hybrid zone and for sudden sympatric species is hybridization. Therefore, determining which insect taxa are most likely to hybridize, and the outcomes of that hybridization, will contribute to our understanding of the evolutionary consequences of global warming. This chapter investigates intrinsic factors affecting hybridization in insects, and we review short- and long-term consequences of non-anthropogenic (natural) and climate-induced hybridization with the goal of summarizing the contribution of these studies to our understanding of the outcomes of the climate-induced hybridization. The chapter focuses on five insect orders whose geographic and altitudinal ranges have been particularly responsive to climate change: dipterans, hymenopterans, lepidopterans, odonates and orthopterans.