Research status and prospect of grassland caterpillars (Lepidoptera:Lymantriidae)

Grassland caterpillars (Lepidoptera, Lymantriidae, Gynaephora) are among the most important insect pests damaging alpine meadow of the Tibetan Plateau. Grassland caterpillars not only feed on high quality forages, leading to the shortage of food for livestocks, changing plant community structure, aggravating grassland degeneration and environmental deterioration, but also cause livestock poisoning, which heavily hinders to the sustainable development of animal husbandry of the Tibetan Plateau. In addition, grassland caterpillars mainly distribute on high mountains and arctic areas, so they are good model systems for studing the evolutionary mechanism of adaption to the extreme environments (e.g. cold and hypoxia). This paper summarized the research status on taxonomy, biology, ecology and control of grassland caterpillars; and suggested the promising research directions, in order to promote the basic and apply researches of grassland caterpillars, which was helpful to plan appropriate strategies for controlling these pests.