Compositional and functional stability of arthropod communities in the face of ant invasions

Author:

Krushelnycky, Paul D., Gillespie, Rosemary G.

Title:

Compositional and functional stability of arthropod communities in the face of ant invasions

Periodical:

Ecological Applications

Year:

2008

Volume:

18

Pages:

p. 1547-1562

Subject:

Argentine ant Ants

Summary:

There is a general agreement that the diversity of a biotic community can have an influence on its stability but not so clear is the strength, ubiquity, and relative importance of this effect. With regard to biological invasions, diversity has usually been studied in terms of its effect on a community's invasibility. However, diversity may also influence stability by affecting the magnitude of compositional or functional changes that is experienced by a community upon invasion. As a result, the compositional and functional stability of arthropod communities at five sites in the Hawaiian islands were investigated in this study that were being invaded by one of two aggressive ant species -- the Argentine ant (Linepithema humile), and the big-headed ant (Pheidole megacephala). Total compositional changes as well as changes in the richness of these communities were also measured as well as its functional stability, in terms of changes in total arthropod biomass and shifts in trophic structure. Also assessed was whether the differences among sites in community diversity and density variables were related to these measures of stability and whether the possibility that of any of these relationships were useful in predicting the magnitude of impacts arising from similar invasions.

Label:

Insects - Ants

URL:

http://cletus.uhh.hawaii.edu:2075/stable/40062273

Date:

September 2008

Collection:

Periodicals