Land use system effects on biodiversity of litter ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in tropical rainforest, South Region of Cameroon.

Abstract

The species diversity of ants in three different land use types: forest, old cocoa farm and palm grove were studied to determine and evaluated the effect of land-use on diversity and composition of ant species in these areas. Four sampling methods: handling capture, sugar-protein bait trap, pitfall trap and berlese, were conducted from september 2021 to october 2022. Species richness and Shannon diversity index were used to characterize diversity of ant communities. A total of 245 ant species, belonging to 37 genera and 8 subfamilies were identified. The specific richness for each area and the Shannon-Wiener’s species diversity index indicated that the diversity was the highest in the forest 192 (H’= 3.01), followed by the old cocoa farm 152 (H’= 2.88) and lastly the palm grove 94 (H’= 2,53). Thirteen (13), nine (09) and two (02) species were restricted to the forest, old cocoa farm and palm grove habitats respectively as indicator species, and showed sensitivity to environmental gradients. These attributes make them potentially useful as subjects or tools for assessing the conservation value of habitats studied. Therefore, the information from this study suggests that anthropogenic disturbances have the impact on the variation of leaf litter ant species diversity.