Ants of the Panga Ecological Station, a Cerrado Reserve in Central Brazil

Abstract

Ants of the Panga Ecological Station, a Cerrado Reserve in Central Brazil Introduction One of the first steps for the establishment of effective conservation actions and monitoring programs is the generation and maintenance of species distribution records (Agosti & Alonso, 2000). In this sense, species lists play an important role because they provide essential data for a more comprehensive analysis of diversity patterns, including biogeographical patterns (Fisher, 2010). The compilation of species lists can also determine the presence of rare, threatened, or ecologically important species (Agosti & Alonso, 2000) that otherwise could be missed in a single survey. In addition, recording the distribution of species is essential for the creation of a data network (Agosti & Alonso, 2000) that can be very important for basic research, allowing taxonomists to access new records of poorly known species. Comprehensive invertebrate surveys are essential for biodiversity studies as invertebrates are highly abundant, diverse, and play key ecological roles in most terrestrial ecosystems Abstract Species lists are an invaluable tool for a more comprehensive analysis of diversity patterns. Such lists, when derived from a comprehensive sampling effort, can indicate the presence of rare, threatened, or ecologically important species. This study aimed to generate a species list of the ants of the Panga Ecological Station, a protected Cerrado reserve in southeastern Brazil. This list was generated through taxonomic identification or through unification of the morphospecies codes of all specimens collected at the reserve in ten different studies since 2003. Information about the types of habitat and strata of occurrence of each species or morphospecies was also compiled. The data presented here represents one of the most intensive ant inventories conducted in the Brazilian Cerrado. We recorded 277 ant species belonging to 58 genera and nine subfamilies. This number is 1.63 to 3.69 times higher than the number of species recorded in other Cerrado localities surveyed so far. More species were collected in the savanna (249 species) than in the forest habitats (108 species), and more species were collected on ground (226 species) than in arboreal vegetation (117 species). Taxonomic identification was possible for 171 of the 277 species collected. Three of the named species are recorded for the first time in Brazil. Among the 106 unidentified species, at least six of them represent new, undescribed species. Together, these results highlight the conservation potential of this Cerrado reserve.

First standardized inventory of ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in the natural grasslands of Paraná: New records for Southern Brazil

“…Avulsos Zool., 2018;v.58: e20185812 3/8 & Gotelli, 2001). Ants, in particular, can occupy a wide range of habitats, from arboreal to below-ground strata (Romero & Jaffé, 1989;Bestelmeyer et al, 2000;Camacho & Vasconcelos, 2016). The pitfall trap was the quantitative method responsible for the largest number of epigaeic species recorded in the present study.…”

Extrafloral nectar as a driver of arboreal ant communities at the site‐scale in Brazilian savanna

“…Cerrado has an exceptionally high arboreal ant diversity compared with tropical savannas elsewhere in the world (Campos et al . ; Camacho & Vasconcelos ), as a reflection of its evolution in association with expansions and contractions of rainforest, from which most of its arboreal ant fauna is derived (Campos et al . ).…”

Ant species (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) of forest fragments and urban areas in a Meridional Amazonian landscape

“…In addition to the tramp ants, other species collected are more limited in distribution and represent new records for Rondônia. Camponotus vittatus Forel, 1904, here recorded for the first time in Rondônia, is a frequently collected species in Midwest and Southeastern Brazil (Ulysséa and Brandão 2013;Melo et al 2014;Camacho and Vasconcelos 2015). Dorymyrmex spurius Santschi, 1929 occurs in drier environments and nests in bare soil (Shattuck 1992); therefore, it can also be found in grasslands or plantations (Brandão et al 2011;Costa-Milanez et al 2014).…”

“…Despite the importance of ant inventories to support decision-making and mitigation plans of biodiversity loss and ant diversity in the Neotropical region (Kempf 1972;Brandão 1991;Fernandez and Sendoya 2004), local inventories of the Brazilian ant fauna are historically concentrated in areas of the Cerrado Camacho and Vasconcelos 2015), Atlantic Forest (Silva et al 2007;Melo et al 2014), and more recently in some localities of the Pantanal (Battirola et al 2005;Silva et al 2013) and Caatinga (Neves et al 2013;Ulyssea and Brandão 2013). However, local surveys in the Brazilian Amazon have focused primarily on the central and eastern areas (Santos et al 2008;Harada et al 2013;Miranda et al 2012).…”