Response of ants, beetles and spiders to disturbance varies among taxa in a South African savannah biome

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17159/2254-8854/2023/a13244

Keywords:

Arthropods, diversity, natural-landscapes, transformed-landscapes

Abstract

Savannahs are structurally complex ecosystems consisting of a diverse community of plants and animals such as arthropods. Arthropods are essential in many ecosystem processes that help maintain life on Earth. The anthropogenic conversion of natural landscapes into croplands, residential and industrial areas has a negative impact on surface-active arthropods that have limited dispersal abilities and narrow habitat preferences. This study investigated the effect of disturbance on assemblages of ants, beetles and spiders in the savannah vegetation in Mpumalanga province, South Africa. We compared species richness, abundance and composition of these three taxa between the pristine savannah and the savannah that is exposed to a variety of anthropogenic activities (disturbed savannah). Arthropods were collected using pitfall traps in 15 sites in pristine savannah and 15 sites in disturbed savannah. We found that disturbance affects species richness and abundance of these taxa differently. Disturbance did not affect species richness of spiders and abundance of beetles, while greater species richness of ants and beetles, as well as abundance of ants and spiders was in disturbed than in pristine savannah. Furthermore, the species compositions of all taxa were different between disturbed and pristine savannah. The disturbed savannah had twice more unique indicator species than the pristine savannah. Differences in assemblages of arthropods between pristine and disturbed habitats suggest that it may be important to consider habitats in and outside protected areas in the conservation of arthropods, particularly in areas with greater percentage of natural and semi-natural landscapes occurring outside protected areas.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Metrics

Metrics Loading ...

References

Agricultural Research Council (ARC) Institute for Soil Climate and Water (ISCW). 2021. Temperature and rainfall data (unpublished). Stellenbosch: ARC-ISCW Agro-climatology division.

Alves da Mata R, Tidon R. 2013. The relative roles of habitat heterogeneity and disturbance in drosophilid assemblages (Diptera, Drosophilidae) in the Cerrado. Insect Conservation and Diversity. 6: 663–670. https://doi.org/10.1111/icad.12020

Andersson P, Koffman A, Sjödin NE, Johansson V. 2017. Roads may act as barriers to flying insects: species composition of bees and wasps differs on two sides of a large highway. Nature Conservation 18: 47–59. https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.18.12314

Arribas P, Andújar C, Salces‐Castellano A, Emerson BC, Vogler AP. 2021. The limited spatial scale of dispersal in soil arthropods revealed with whole‐community haplotype‐level metabarcoding. Molecular Ecology. 30: 48–61. https://doi.org/ 10.1111/mec.15591

Barahona-Segovia RM, Crespin SJ, Grez AA, Veloso C. 2019. Anthropogenic thermal gradient in managed landscapes determines physiological performance and explains the edge-biased distribution of ectothermic arthropods. Forest Ecology and Management. 440: 147–157. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2019.03.018

Barlow J, Gardner TA, Louzada J, Peres CA. 2010. Measuring the conservation value of tropical primary forests: the effect of occasional species on estimates of biodiversity uniqueness. PLoS One. 5: e9609. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0009609.

Bell KL, Heard TA, Manion G, Ferrier S, Van Klinken RD. 2013. The role of geography and environment in species turnover: phytophagous arthropods on a Neotropical legume. Journal of Biogeography. 40: 1755–1766. https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.12102

Berman M, Andersen AN, Ibanez T. 2013. Invasive ants as back-seat drivers of native ant diversity decline in New Caledonia. Biological Invasions. 15: 2311–2331. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-013-0455-6

Bishop L, Riechert SE. 1990. Spider colonization of agroecosystems: mode and source. Environmental Entomology. 19: 1738–1745. https://doi.org/10.1093/ee/19.6.1738

Blaum N, Seymour C, Rossmanith E, Schwager M, Jeltsch F. 2009. Changes in arthropod diversity along a land use driven gradient of shrub cover in savanna rangelands: identification of suitable indicators. Biodiversity and Conservation. 18: 1187–1199. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-008-9498-x

Bolker BM, Brooks ME, Clark CJ, Geange SW, Poulsen JR, Stevens MHH, White JSS. 2009. Generalized linear mixed models: a practical guide for ecology and evolution. Trends in Ecology and Evolution. 24: 127–135. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2008.10.008

Botes A, Mcgeoch M, Robertson H, Van Niekerk A, Davids H, Chown SL. 2006. Ants, altitude and change in the northern Cape Floristic Region. Journal of Biogeography. 33: 71–90. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2699.2005.01336.x

Bouchard P. 2014. The Book of Beetles: A Life-Size Guide to Six Hundred of Nature’s Gems. Chicago, USA. University of Chicago Press.

Brennan KE, Majer JD, Moir ML. 2005. Refining sampling protocols for inventorying invertebrate biodiversity: influence of drift–fence length and pitfall trap diameter on spiders. Journal of Arachnology. 33: 681–702. https://doi.org/10.1636/M01-105.1

Bruwer IJ, Giliomee JH, Pringle KL. 2021. The relationship between proboscis length and the ability of certain Heteroptera to damage macadamia kernels. African Entomology. 29: 112−124. https://doi.org/10.4001/003.029.0112

Connell JH. 1978. Diversity in tropical rain forests and coral reefs. Science. 199: 1302–1310. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.199.4335.1302

Copley CR, Winchester NN. 2010. Effect of disturbance and distance from a riparian corridor on spiders in a temperate rainforest. Canadian Journal of Forest Research. 40: 904–916. https://doi.org/10.1139/X10-043

Correa CM, Braga RF, Louzada J, Menéndez R. 2019. Dung beetle diversity and functions suggest no major impacts of cattle grazing in the Brazilian Pantanal wetlands. Ecological Entomology. 44: 524–33. https://doi.org/10.1111/een.12729

Daniel GM, Noriega JA, Da Silva PG, Deschodt CM, Sole CL, Scholtz CH. Davis AL. 2022. Soil type, vegetation cover and temperature determinants of the diversity and structure of dung beetle assemblages in a South African open woodland and closed canopy mosaic. Austral Ecology. 47: 79–91. https://doi.org/10.1111/aec.13138

De Caceres M, Legendre P. 2009. Associations between species and groups of sites: indices and statistical inference. Ecology. 90: 3566–3574. https://doi.org/10.1890/08-1823.1

De Visser SN, Freymann BP, Foster RF, Nkwabi AK, Metzger KL, Harvey AW, Sinclair ARE. 2015. Invertebrates of the Serengeti: Disturbance Effects on Arthropod Diversity and Abundance. In: Anthony, RES, Kristine, LM, Simon, ARM., John, MF, editors. Serengeti IV: Sustaining Biodiversity in a Coupled Human-natural System. Chicago, U.S.A.: University of Chicago Press; p. 265–300.

Dippenaar-Schoeman AS. 2014. Field guide to the spiders of South Africa. Cape Town, South Africa: Lapa.

Dippenaar-Schoeman AS, Jocqué R. 1997. African spiders: an identification manual. Volume 9. Pretoria, South Africa: ARC-Plant Protection Research Institute.

Dormann CF, Mcpherson JM, Araújo MB, Bivand R, Bolliger J, Carl G, Davies RG, Hirzel A, Jetz W, Kissling WD, Kühn I, Ohlemüller R, Peres-Neto PD, Reineking B, Schröder B, Schurr FM, Wilson R. 2007. Methods to account for spatial autocorrelation in the analysis of species distributional data: a review. Ecography. 30: 609−628. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2007.0906-7590.05171.x

Eisenhauer N, Bonn A, Guerra CA. 2019. Recognising the quiet extinction of invertebrates. Nature Communications. 10. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-07916-1.

Filmer MR. 2011. Filmer’s Spiders: an identification guide for Southern Africa. Cape Town, South Africa: Penguin Random House South Africa.

Fisher BL, Bolton B. 2016. Ants of Africa and Madagascar: a guide to the genera. Berkeley, U.S.A: University of California Press.

Gallé R, Császár P, Makra T, Gallé-Szpisjak N, Ladányi Z, Torma A, Ingle K, Szilassi P. 2018. Small-scale agricultural landscapes promote spider and ground beetle densities by offering suitable overwintering sites. Landscape Ecology. 33: 1435–1446. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-018-0677-1

Gerlach J, Samways M, Pryke J. 2013. Terrestrial invertebrates as bioindicators: an overview of available taxonomic groups. Journal of Insect Conservation. 17: 831–850. https://doi.org/org/10.1007/s10841-013-9565-9

Gittleman JL, Kot M. 1990. Adaptation: statistics and a null model for estimating phylogenetic effects. Systematic Zoology. 39: 227−241. https://doi.org/ 10.2307/2992183

Grime JP. 1973. Competitive exclusion in herbaceous vegetation. Nature. 242: 344–347. https://doi.org/10.1038/242344a0

Hanski I, Cambefort Y. 2014. Dung beetle ecology. Princeton, U.S.A: Princeton University Press.

Hill JG, Summerville KS, Brown RL. 2008. Habitat associations of ant species (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in a heterogenous Mississippi landscape. Environmental Enologogy. 37: 453 −463. https://doi.org/10.1603/0046-225x(2008)37[453:haoash]2.0.co;2

Hlongwane ZT, Mwabvu T, Munyai TC, Tsvuura Z. 2019. Epigaeic ant diversity and distribution in the Sandstone Sourveld in KwaZulu‐Natal, South Africa. African Journal of Ecology. 57: 382–393. https://doi.org/10.1111/aje.12615

Hoffmann H, Peter F, Herrmann JD, Donath TW, Diekötter T. 2021. Benefits of wildflower areas as overwintering habitats for ground-dwelling arthropods depend on landscape structural complexity. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment. 314:107421. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2021.107421

Holm E, Dippenaar-Schoeman AS. 2010. Goggo guide: the arthropods of southern Africa. Johannesburg, South Africa: Lapa.

Horn HS. 1975. Markovian properties of forest succession. In: Cody, ML, Diamond, JM, editors. Ecology and Evolution of Communities. Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.A.: Belknap Press; p.196–211.

Høye TT, Culler LE. 2018. Tundra arthropods provide key insights into ecological responses to environmental change. Polar Biology. 41: 1523–1529. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-018-2370-x

Hui FKC. 2016. BORAL-Bayesian ordination and regression analysis of multivariate abundance data in R. Methods in Ecology and Evolution. 7: 744–750. https://doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12514

Hurlbert SF. 2004. On misinterpretations of pseudoreplication and related matters: a reply to Oksanen. Oikos 104: 591–597. https://doi.org/ 10.1111/j.0030-1299.2004.12752.x

Hussein EA, El-Ghani MM, Hamdy RS, Shalabi LF. 2021. Do anthropogenic activities affect floristic diversity and vegetation structure more than natural soil properties in Hyper-Arid desert environments? Diversity. 13. https://doi.org/ 10.3390/d13040157

Husseini R, Abubakar A, Nasare LI. 2019. Effect of anthropogenic disturbances on insect diversity and abundance in the Sinsablegbini forest reserve, Ghana. The International Journal of Developmental Biology. 6: 2026−5336. https://doi.org/10.47740/388.UDSIJD6i

Hutley LB, Setterfield SA. 2018. Savanna. In: Fath, B, editor. Encyclopedia of Ecology. 2nd edition. Oxford, U.K.: Elsevier BV; p. 3143−3153.

Hyvärinen O, Hoffman MT, Reynolds C. 2019. Vegetation dynamics in the face of a major land-use change: a 30-year case study from semi-arid South Africa. African Journal of Range and Forage Science. 36: 141–150. https://doi.org/10.2989/10220119.2019.1627582

Jewitt D, Goodman PS, Erasmus BF, O’connor TG, Witkowski ET. 2015. Systematic land-cover change in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa: implications for biodiversity. South African Journal of Science. 111: 01–09. https://doi.org/10.17159/sajs.2015/20150019

Kaur H, Torma A, Gallé-Szpisjak N, Šeat J, Lőrinczi G, Módra G, Gallé R. 2019. Road verges are important secondary habitats for grassland. Journal of Insect Conservation 2: 899–907. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10841-019-00171-9

King JR, Tschinkel WR. 2008. Experimental evidence that human impacts drive fire ant invasions and ecological change. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 105: 20339–20343. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0809423105

Krebs CJ. 1999. Ecological methodology. 2nd edition. California, U.S.A: Benjamin Cummings.

Lavelle P, Decaëns T, Aubert M, Barot SB, Blouin M, Bureau F, Margerie P, Mora P, Rossi JP. 2006. Soil invertebrates and ecosystem services. European Journal of Soil Biology. 42: S3–S15. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejsobi.2006.10.002

Lehmann CE, Anderson TM, Sankaran M, Higgins SI, Archibald S, Hoffmann WA, Hanan NP, Williams RJ, Fensham RJ, Felfili J. 2014. Savanna vegetation-fire-climate relationships differ among continents. Science. 343: 548–552. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1247355

Leonard EE, Mast AM, Hawkins CP, Kettenring KM. 2021. Arthropod assemblages in invasive and native vegetation of Great Salt Lake wetlands. Wetlands. 41. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-021-01446-1

Leweri C, Ojija F. 2018. Impact of anthropogenic habitat changes on insects: a case study of mount Loleza forest reserve. International Journal of Entomology Research. 3: 36−43.

Macgown JOE, Boudinot B, Deyrup M, Sorger DM. 2014. A review of the Nearctic Odontomachus (Hymenoptera: Formicidae: Ponerinae) with a treatment of the males. Zootaxa. 3802: 515−552. https://doi.org/ 10.11646/zootaxa.3802.4.6

Maleque MA, Maeto K, Ishii HT. 2009. Arthropods as bioindicators of sustainable forest management, with a focus on plantation forests. Applied Entomology and Zoology. 44: 1−11. https://doi.org/10.1303/aez.2009.1

Marquart A, Geissler K, Heblach J, Lobas C, Münch E, Blaum N. 2020. Individual shrubs, large scale grass cover and seasonal rainfall explain invertebrate-derived macropore density in a semi-arid Namibian savanna. Journal of Arid Environments. 176. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2020.104101

Martínez E, Rös M, Bonilla MA, Dirzo R. 2015. Habitat heterogeneity affects plant and arthropod species diversity and turnover in traditional cornfields. PLoS One. 10: e0128950. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0128950

Mauda EV, Joseph GS, Seymour CL, Munyai TC, Foord SH. 2018. Changes in land use alter ant diversity, assemblage composition and dominant functional groups in African savannas. Biodiversity and Conservation. 27: 947–965. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-017-1474-x

Melliger RL, Braschler B, Rusterholz HP, Baur B. 2018. Diverse effects of degree of urbanisation and forest size on species richness and functional diversity of plants, and ground surface-active ants and spiders. PLoS One. 13. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0199245

Moorhead LC, Philpott SM. 2013. Richness and composition of spiders in urban green spaces in Toledo, Ohio. Journal of Arachnology. 41: 356–363. https://doi.org/10.1636/P12-44

Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency. 2019. Barberton Nature Reserve. Pii Digital. Available from: http://www.mpumalanga.com/our-provincial-parks/barberton-nature-reserve. (accessed 18 September 2021)

Mucina L, Rutherford MC. 2010. The vegetation of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland. Pretoria, South Africa: South African National Biodiversity Institute.

Mwambilwa K, Kirkman KP, Tsvuura Z. 2021. Influence of burning and defoliation on Festuca costata (Nees) in the Drakensberg. African Journal of Range and Forage Science. https://doi.org/ 10.2989/10220119.2021.1900394

Niemelä J, Spence JR, Spence DH. 1992. Habitat associations and seasonal activity of ground beetles (Coleoptera, Carabidae) in central Alberta. Canadian Entomologist. 124: 521–540. https://doi.org/10.4039/Ent124521-3

Oksanen J, Blanchet G, Friendly M, Kindt R, Legendre P, Mcglinn D, Minchin P, O’hara B, Simpson G, Solymos P, Stevens H, Szoecs E, Wagner H. 2020. Vegan: Community Ecology Package.

Osborne CP, Charles-Dominique T, Stevens N, Bond WJ, Midgley G, Lehmann CER. 2018. Human impacts in African savannas are mediated by plant functional traits. New Phytologist. 220: 10−24. https://doi.org/10.1111/nph.15236

Osman R. 2015. The intermediate disturbance hypothesis. In: Fath, B, editor. Encyclopedia of Ecology. 2nd edition. Oxford, U.K. Elsevier BV; p. 441−450.

Pacheco R, Vasconcelos HL. 2012. Habitat diversity enhances ant diversity in a naturally heterogeneous Brazilian landscape. Biodiversity and Conservation. 21: 797–809. https://doi.org/ 10.1007/s10531-011-0221-y

Paradis E, Schliep K. 2019. Ape 5.0: an environment for modern phylogenics and evolutionary analyses in R. Bioinformatics. 35: 526−528. https://doi.org/ 10.1093/bioinformatics/bty633

Picker M, Griffiths C, Weaving A. 2019. Field guide to insects of South Africa. 2nd edition. Cape Town, South Africa: Penguin Random House South Africa.

Pryke JS, Roets F, Samways MJ. 2016. Wild herbivore grazing enhances insect diversity over livestock grazing in an African grassland system. PloS One. 11. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0164198

Rahman AU, Jones HP, Hosler SC, Geddes S, Nelson M, Barber NA. 2021. Disturbance-induced trophic niche shifts in ground beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae) in restored grasslands. Environmental Entomology. 50: 1075–1087. https://doi.org/10.1093/ee/nvab065

Roy S, Roy MM, Jaiswal AK, Baitha A. 2018. Soil arthropods in maintaining soil health: thrust areas for sugarcane production systems. Sugar Tech. 20: 376–391. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12355-018-0591-5

Rutherford MC, Powrie LW, Husted LB. 2014. Herbivore-driven land degradation: consequences for plant diversity and soil in arid subtropical thicket in south-eastern Africa. Land Degradation and Development. 25: 541–553. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.2181

Samways MJ, Mcgeoch MA, New TR. 2010. Insect conservation: a handbook of approaches and methods. New York, U.S.A: Oxford University Press.

Savitha S, Barve N, Davidar P. 2008. Response of ants to disturbance gradients in and around Bangalore, India. Journal of Tropical Ecology. 49: 235–243.

Santos R, Dodonov P, Delabie JH. 2021. Effects of habitat conservation on ant functional groups: a global review. Sociobiology. 68: e6071. https://doi.org/ 10.13102/sociobiology.v68i2.6071

Schmidt MH, Thies C, Nentwig W, Tscharntke T. 2008. Contrasting responses of arable spiders to the landscape matrix at different spatial scales. Journal of Biogeography. 35: 157–166. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2699.2007.01774.x

Seibold S, Gossner MM, Simons NK, Blüthgen N, Müller J, Ambarl D, Ammer C, Bauhus J, Fischer M, Habel JC, Linsenmair KE, Nauss T, Penone C, Prati D, Schall P, Schulze ED, Vogt J, Wöllauer S, Weisser WW. 2019. Arthropod decline in grasslands and forests is associated with landscape-level drivers. Nature. 574: 671–674. Https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1684-3

Silva Da Costa MM, Schmidt FA. 2022. Gamma, alpha, and beta diversity of ant assemblages response to a gradient of forest cover in human‐modified landscape in Brazilian Amazon. Biotropica. 54: 515–524. https://doi.org/ 10.1111/btp.13073

Silva PSD, Bieber AGD, Corrêa MM, Leal IR. 2011. Do leaf-litter attributes affect the richness of leaf litter ants? Neotropical Entomology. 40: 542−457. doi.org/10.1590/S1519-566X2011000500004

Simioni G, Gignoux J, Le Roux X. 2003. Tree layer spatial structure can affect savanna production and water budget: results of a 3‐D model. Ecology. 84: 1879–1894. https://doi.org/10.1890/0012-9658(2003)084[1879:TLSSCA]2.0.CO;2

Smith AK, Slippers B, Hurley BP, Fourie G. 2022. Diversity of Lepidoptera associated with macadamia nut damage in South Africa and development of molecular tools to monitor pest populations. Agricultural and Forest Entomology. 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1111/afe.12497

Ste-Marie E, Turney S, Buddle CM. 2018. The effect of road proximity on arthropod communities in Yukon, Canada. Arctic. 71: 89−98. https://doi.org/10.14430/arctic4702

Stenchly K, Clough Y, Tscharntke T. 2012. Spider species richness in cocoa agroforestry systems, comparing vertical strata, local management and distance to forest. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment. 149: 189–194. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2011.03.021

Stork NE. 2018. How many species of insects and other terrestrial arthropods are there on Earth? Annual Review of Entomology. 63: 31–45. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ento-020117-043348

Suheriyanto D, Soemarno S, Yanuwiadi B, Leksono AS, Prasetiyo DH, Permana R. 2019. Effects of season on abundance and diversity of soil arthropods in Mangli coffee plantation Kediri Regency, East Java, Indonesia. International Journal of Engineering and Technology. 8: 131–135. https://doi.org/10.14419/ijet.v8i1.9.26385

Swart RC, Pryke JS, Roets F. 2019. The intermediate disturbance hypothesis explains arthropod beta-diversity responses to roads that cut through natural forests. Biological Conservation. 236: 243–251. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2019.03.045

Thoresen J, Vermeire ML, Venter Z, Wolfaard G, Krumins JA, Cramer M, Hawkins HJ. 2021. Fire and herbivory shape soil arthropod communities through habitat heterogeneity and nutrient cycling in savannas. Global Ecology and Conservation. 25. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2020.e01413

Uehara-Prado M, Fernandes JO, Bello AM, Machado G, Santos AJ, Vaz-De-Mello FZ, Freitas AVL. 2009. Selecting terrestrial arthropods as indicators of small-scale disturbance: a first approach in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. Biological Conservation. 142: 1220−1228. https://doi.org/ 10.1016/j.biocon.2009.01.008

Uhey D, Haubensak K, Hofstetter R. 2021. Mid-elevational peaks in diversity of ground-dwelling arthropods with high species turnover on the Colorado Plateau. Environmental Entomology. 50: 337–347. https://doi.org/10.1093/ee/nvaa166

Van Den Berg MA, Steyn WP, Greenland J. 1999. Hemiptera occurring on macadamia in the Mpumalanga Lowveld of South Africa. African Plant Protection. 5: 89–92.

Vasconcelos HL, Pacheco R, Silva RC, Vasconcelos PB, Lopes CT, Costa AN, Bruna EM. 2009. Dynamics of the leaf-litter arthropod fauna following fire in a Neotropical woodland savanna. PLoS One 4. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0007762

Venables WN, Ripley BD. 2002. Statistics and computing: modern applied statistics with S. New York, U.S.A: Springer.

Wagner PM, Abagandura GO, Mamo M, Weissling T, Wingeyer A, BradshaW JD. 2021. Abundance and diversity of dung beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea) as affected by grazing management in the Nebraska sandhills ecosystem. Environmental Entomology. 50: 222−231. https://doi.org/10.1093/ee/nvaa130

Wakeling JL, Cramer MD, Bond WJ. 2012. The savanna‐grassland ‘treeline’: why don’t savanna trees occur in upland grasslands? Journal of Ecology. 100: 381–391. https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1365-2745.2011.01921.X.

Wang Y, Naumann U, Wright S, Warton D. 2012. Mvabund: an R package for model-based analysis of multivariate data. Methods in Ecology and Evolution. 3: 471–474. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-210X.2012.00190.x

White RE. 1998. The Beetles of North America. Boston, U.S.A: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Whitmore C, Slotow R, Crouch TE, Dippenaar-Schoeman AS. 2002. Diversity of spiders (Araneae) in a savanna reserve, Northern Province, South Africa. Journal of Arachnology. 30: 344-356. https://doi.org/10.1636/0161-8202(2002)030[0344:DOSAIA]2.0.CO;2

Wigley BJ, Bond WJ, Hoffman MT. 2010. Thicket expansion in a South African savanna under divergent land use: local vs. global drivers? Global Change Biology 16: 964–976. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2486.2009.02030.x

Wimp GM, Martinsen GD, Floate KD, Bangert RK, Whitham TG. 2005. Plant genetic determinants of arthropod community structure and diversity. Evolution. 59: 61–69. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0014-3820.2005.tb00894.x

Woodcock BA. 2005. Pitfall trapping in ecological studies. In: Leather, SR, editor. Insect Sampling in Forest Ecosystems. Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell Publishing; p. 37–57.

Yekwayo I, Mwabvu T. 2019. Diversity and composition of flightless arthropods on rock outcrops and adjacent vegetation in the savannah, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa. African Journal of Ecology. 57: 443–447. https://doi.org/ https://doi.org/10.1111/aje.12617

Yekwayo I, Pryke JS, Gaigher R, Samways MJ. 2018. Only multi-taxon studies show the full range of arthropod responses to fire. PLoS One. 13. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0195414

Downloads

Additional Files

Published

2023-02-10

How to Cite

1.
Mavasa R, Yekwayo I, Mwabvu T, Tsvuura Z. Response of ants, beetles and spiders to disturbance varies among taxa in a South African savannah biome. Afr. Entomol. [Internet]. 2023 Feb. 10 [cited 2024 Mar. 29];31. Available from: https://www.africanentomology.com/article/view/13244

Issue

Section

Articles

Funding data