Climate variability and aridity modulate the role of leaf shelters for arthropods: A global experiment.

Current climate change is disrupting biotic interactions and eroding biodiversity worldwide. However, species sensitive to aridity, high temperatures, and climate variability might find shelter in microclimatic refuges, such as leaf rolls built by arthropods. To explore how the importance of leaf shelters for terrestrial arthropods changes with latitude, elevation, and climate, we conducted a distributed experiment comparing arthropods in leaf rolls versus control leaves across 52 sites along an 11,790 km latitudinal gradient.

Subtle structures with not-so-subtle functions: A data set of arthropod constructs and their host plants.

The construction of shelters on plants by arthropods might influence other organisms via changes in colonization, community richness, species composition, and functionality. Arthropods, including beetles, caterpillars, sawflies, spiders, and wasps often interact with host plants via the construction of shelters, building a variety of structures such as leaf ties, tents, rolls, and bags; leaf and stem galls, and hollowed out stems. Such constructs might have both an adaptive value in terms of protection (i.