Current speed and filtration rate link caddisfly phylogeny and distributional patterns on a stream gradient.

Patterns of body size and net construction suggest that current speed and food-particle concentration (not size) influence the distribution of suspension-feeding caddisflies on a downstream gradient. Large ancestral taxa with high filtration rates occur in resource-poor upstream habitats; more derived members of the phylogeny enter successively in downstream reaches with slower current and greater concentrations of particulate food.