Recent developments and ten major questions toward understanding the history of arthropod and plant disease herbivory in the fossil record

There are varying approaches toward evaluating fossil and modern arthropod and pathogen herbivory on land plants. Historically, traditional metrics have been used in numerous studies as well as a recent metric designed to measure herbivory at a fine-grained scale. Application of these methods are designed to address major ecological and evolutionary questions in the fossil record of plants and their interactions with insects, mites, and pathogens. Ten germane questions are provided and discussed for addressing major events in the fossil record that have altered the trajectory of herbivory in space and time. These events deserve further exploration for understanding the ecological dynamics of plant hosts and their herbivorous arthropods and pathogens. A special emphasis is placed on exploring the least understood event: the relationships between Oligocene and Neogene grassland hosts and their non-vertebrate herbivores.