Dead wood provides habitat for springtails across a latitudinal gradient of forests in Quebec, Canada

Abstract

Understanding the importance of dead wood-associated biodiversity and related ecological functions has become increasingly important in forest ecosystem management. Yet, studies on dead wood diversity frequently focus on conspicuous organisms such as birds or saproxylic beetles, and are rarely deployed across significant climatic gradients. Here, we investigated the potential role of deadwood as a habitat for springtails, an understudied group of invertebrates generally associated with soils, and tested how these communities were influenced by climate. Black spruce logs were placed in 13 natural forest sites which were distributed among 3 latitudinal zones (southern, central and northern Quebec, Canada). We compared the springtail communities that colonized the logs through different metrics: abundance, richness and species composition. Our results indicated that dead wood was used as a habitat by 74 springtail species. A clear latitudinal diversity gradient was observed, with southern communities being on average two times richer and over 13 times more abundant than the northern ones per log. Moreover, distinct community compositions were observed in the three zones. Overall, our results suggest that (1) dead wood retention could be beneficial for small invertebrates such as springtails and (2) such biodiversity conservation measures would be more efficient if done systematically along large geographic gradients encompassing different biomes, particularly in the context of climate change.