Nature's fast food: frogs as invertebrate prey in a northern Atlantic Forest fragment

Abstract

The understanding of the trophic interactions of the ecological network is of great importance, sometimes being able to describe how the flow of energy in the ecosystem occurs, in addition to showing how the community is structured, is essential in its composition. Frogs inhabit a wide spectrum of habitats, which culminates in a large number of ecological interactions in networks, sometimes qualifying as predators and prey of many species, whether vertebrates or even invertebrates. The present work describe five records of predation of anurans by spiders, mantis and water bugs in a northern Atlantic Forest fragment in the Estação Ecológica de Murici, municipality of Murici, state of Alagoas, Brazil. Knowing frog predators, where they live and how they act is of great importance in understanding the ecological dynamics and evolutionary anti-preying mechanisms developed by this group, providing relevant information for studies of natural history and evolution.