Ecosystem disturbances and diversity increase: implications for invertebrate conservation

Diversity and composition of flightless arthropods on rock outcrops and adjacent vegetation in the savannah, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa

“…Furthermore, disturbed habitats experience different environmental conditions from undisturbed habitats (Van Nuland & Whitlow, ). Disturbed habitats support fewer microhabitats, such as leaf litter and logs (Loyola et al, ; Van Nuland & Whitlow, ), which are important niche for flightless arthropods (Neoh et al, ). Our results support previous studies, which demonstrated that arthropod assemblages are altered by the land use type (Mauda et al, ; Melliger et al, ; Van Nuland & Whitlow, ).…”

“…Anthropogenic activities, such as disturbance through residential development, invasion by exotic species and conversion to agricultural land (Mauda, Joseph, Seymour, Munyai, & Foord, ; Veldman & Putz, ), decrease plant diversity, thereby reducing arthropod diversity because of their positive association with plants (Rhoades, Davis, Tinkham, & Hoffman, ). Furthermore, high plant diversity increases availability of mesofilters, such as leaf litter and logs, which serve as nesting sites and/or food for some arthropods (Loyola, Brito, & Ferreira, ; Uno, Cotton, & Philpott, ).…”

Edge contrast modulates ant community responses to edge distance in agricultural landscapes

“…Intensive crop management in sugarcane is expected to negatively affect ground dwelling invertebrates like ants (Stork & Eggleton, 1992), probably leading to the impoverishment of communities while benefiting generalist species. On the other hand, pastures are less managed and structurally more similar to some open Cerrado vegetation (low contrast), which can support a high diversity of invertebrates (Benito et al, 2004; Loyola et al, 2006; Martello et al, 2016), explaining the linear increment in ant diversity from the core of a habitat to another. The evidence of our study that the community composition and type of matrix that composed the edge are important factors to understand how edge affects ant communities, highlights the importance of studying high diverse taxonomic groups, such as ants, since the variety of species responses to environmental disturbances helps to clarify how communities respond to environmental disturbances.…”

Linking forest dynamics to richness and assemblage of soil zoological groups and to soil mineralization processes

“…If decrease of herbaceous cover, soil impoverishment, accumulation of spruce needles, and soil acidification, which occur during the forest cycle, are actually responsible for changes in soil functioning and in the composition and diversity of animal communities, then a decrease in the size of stand management areas (particularly in lowland forests where the size of stands is very large), would reduce those processes and consequently improve the diversity of zoological groups. A patchwork of stand management areas should increase the heterogeneity of the soil environment on a larger spatial scale and, consequently, facilitate the coexistence of species from diverse groups on a macrogeographic scale (Loyola et al, 2006;Toljander et al, 2006).…”