Relationships between leaf age and the food quality of cottonwood foliage for the gypsy moth, Lymantria dispar.

The cottonwood tree, Populus deltoides, continues to produce leaves late into the growing season, exposing midseason herbivores to leaves of a wide range of maturity. Gypsy moth larvae preferred and grew best on the oldest cottonwood leaves and suffered higher mortality and 85% less growth when fed young, expanding leaves. Concentration of phenolics in the youngest leaves was 3 times that in the oldest leaves and was negatively correlated with caterpillar growth rate. The active phenolics were not identified; tannin was present but its concentration changed more with season than leaf age.