A Checklist of Arthropods Recorded on Exposed Pig Carrion in Neke, Enugu State, Nigeria.

Abstract

A comprehensive study of insects recovered on the decaying pig was carried out from 7th June to 7th September, 2018 to identify the arthropods connected with the pig carrions. The study revealed that Diptera, Coleoptera, Hymenoptera and Isoptera were the group of insects that were collected on the carrions. At the fresh stage, there were 78 insects and at the bloated stage there were 182 insects while at the active decay stage there were 262 and at the advanced decay stage there were 319 insects as the dry decay stage yielded only 119 insects. The Simpson index was high (0.95) in the active decay and advanced decay stages but was low (0.89) in the fresh and dry decay stages. The Dominance index was high (0.11) in the fresh and dry decay stages of but was low (0.05) in the active and advanced decay stages and the Shannon-Weiner index (H) was high (3.09) in the advanced decay stage but low (2.33) in the dry decay stage. The Evenness index (E) was high (0.95) in the fresh stage but low (0.86) in the dry decay stage. Richness index: Margalef (R) was high (4.03) in the advanced decay stag but was low (2.07) in the fresh stage as the Equitability index was high (0.98) in the fresh and bloated stages but low (0.94) in the dry decay stage. The score plot of the PCA shows a scatter plot of species distribution in carrion for components 1 and 2. Component 1 accounted for 42.3% of the variation in the dataset while component 2 accounted for 24.6% making a total of 66.9%.