Data for a lab study of the effects of diet variability on the interactions between a Lepidopteran herbivore and its parasitoid

Data were collected from two laboratory rearing experiments conducted in 2018 of Trichoplusia ni caterpillars that had been parasitized by Copidosoma floridanum parasitoids. In the first experiment, parasitized caterpillars were fed artificial diets spiked with increasing concentrations of the phytochemical xanthotoxin in order to assess the effect of xanthotoxin on parasitoid success. In the second experiment, parasitized caterpillars were switched between diets with differing xanthotoxin concentration, such that all caterpillars experienced the same mean xanthotoxin concentration over their lives, but different treatments experienced different variability in xanthotoxin concentration. Data were recorded on caterpillar survival and parasitoid fitness components (e.g. number of offspring, proportion of offspring emerging from host, sex ratio of adult offspring).