Abstract
Ants make up an important group of insects of the Cerrado in terms of biomass, number of individuals, and ecological impact. The main goals of this study were to quantify the species richness and species diversity of the family Formicidae in two riparian Cerrado physiognomies: Ciliary Forest and Gallery Forest, and to evaluate the effectiveness of two collection techniques for these organisms. The study was conducted during the dry season, comprising the months of May to October 2012, in the municipality of Quirinópolis, Goiás State, Brazil. Samples were made using two capture techniques: sardine baits and pitfall traps. Manual collection was employed to extend the range of faunistic composition of the ants. We collected 24 species of ants in the Gallery Forest and 23 in the Ciliary Forest. The genus Megalomyrmex was the most representative, being present in 49.46% of the samples, and secondly the genus Pheidole, with 15.36% of the total individuals captured. From a total of 10,917 individuals, 9140 were captured using the bait technique, 1738 with traps, and 39 individuals through manual collection. Similar results were found in the Cerrado of Paineiras, with 45 ant species distributed in 16 genera belonging to 5 subfamilies.
Highlights
Ants have characteristics relevant to the study of biodiversity, such as plasticity, high diversity, numerical and biomass dominance in various habitats, ease of sampling, as well as the presence of stationary nests, allowing resampling over time [1]
The study was conducted between May and October 2012, comprising the dry season and the transition to the rainy season, near the Douradinho Farm, 30 km from the city center of Quirinópolis in the State of Goiás, Brazil (South—18.437507, West—50.664171, with an average altitude of 494 M) (Figure 1)
A total of 10,917 ants were collected, with 24 species found in the Gallery Forest (GF) and 23 in the Ciliary Forest (CF), and belonging to 6 subfamilies (Table 1); 9140 individuals were caught with the bait trap technique, while 1738 with pitfall traps, and 39 individuals through manual collection
Summary
Ants have characteristics relevant to the study of biodiversity, such as plasticity, high diversity, numerical and biomass dominance in various habitats, ease of sampling, as well as the presence of stationary nests, allowing resampling over time [1] They are excellent seed dispersers influencing the processes of forest regeneration [2], modifying the seed deposition generated by primary dispersers, and influencing the spatial distribution of plant populations, a number of species can be considered ecosystem engineers [3]. Due to this tight linkage with vegetation, they are highly sensitive to environmental variations, and are considered excellent bioindicators of an ecosystem [4] Factors such as nesting sites, trunk roughness, and specific food resources such as extrafloral nectaries and sugar-rich hemipteran excreta, make areas of the Cerrado biome, including its phytophysiognomies (Ciliary Forests, Gallery Forests, Dry Forest, and Cerradão (xeromorphic forest), sites of great importance for the study of ant fauna. These species are highly adapted to foraging and nesting in plants, suggesting a high richness of ants in these areas [5]
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