D3129: (2nd Place) Investigating insect decline through an assessment of the conservation status of tallgrass prairie Auchenorrhyncha (Hemiptera) of Illinois

In recent years, insect decline has become a pressing issue that has been widely discussed and debated. Despite the large conversation around the topic, there are still many areas that are left unaddressed by current literature. Most studies investigating insect decline focus on broad-scale measurements of biodiversity such as biomass and species richness and on more charismatic insects like butterflies and bees. To overcome these limitations, we are focusing on the less-studied Hemipteran suborder Auchenorrhyncha (i.e., leafhoppers, treehoppers, planthoppers, and spittlebugs) and assessing changes in individual species over 25 years. Auchenorrhynchans are a diverse group of insects that provide important ecosystem services to their communities and act as indicators to assess habitat quality. To investigate changes in auchenorrhynchan species, we are revisiting tallgrass prairies throughout Illinois that were previously sampled 25 years ago and sampling them again using the same collecting methods. We are then comparing the presence and abundance of individual species in current samples to the historical samples to understand how auchenorrhynchan community structures have changed over time in these prairies. So far, our findings are consistent with our hypotheses that species richness will not have changed considerably but that species composition will differ between current and historical samples. Our preliminary findings show that less than half of the species present at these sites 25 years ago are still present, suggesting that these communities are experiencing the effects of insect decline.