Public Engagement Provides First Insights on Po Plain Ant Communities and Reveals the Ubiquity of the Cryptic Species Tetramorium immigrans (Hymenoptera, Formicidae)

Ants are considered a useful model for biodiversity monitoring and several of their characteristics make them promising for citizen science (CS) projects. Involving a wide range of public figures into collecting valuable data on the effect of human impact on ant biodiversity, the School of Ants (SoA) project represents one of the very few attempts to explore the potential of these insects in CS. Through the collaboration with the "BioBlitz Lombardia" project, we tested the SoA protocol on 12 Northern Italy parks, ranging from urban green to subalpine protected sites. As a result, we obtained some of the very first quantitative data characterizing the ants of this region, recording 30 species and highlighting some interesting ecological patterns. These data revealed the ubiquitous presence of the recently taxonomically defined cryptic species Tetramorium immigrans, which appears to be probably introduced in the region. We also discuss advantages and criticisms encountered applying the SoA protocol, originally intended for schools, to new categories of volunteers, from BioBlitz participants to park operators, suggesting best practices based on our experience

A new exception to the dominance-discovery trade-off rule in ant communities

Interspecific competition is one of the main factor shaping ant community structure. The “dominance-discovery trade-off’’, an inverse relationship between interference and exploitative competitive ability, is thought to be a fundamental mechanism facilitating coexistence of ants. Despite its widely acceptance in literature, this trade-off appears to be broken in several cases and needs further investigations. Thus, the aim of the present study was to detect the presence/absence of the dominance-discovery trade-off in Mediterranean ant communities. Samplings were conducted inside the Presidential Estate of Castelporziano (Rome, Italy) and seven sampling sites were selected according to their vegetation structure. In each site, baiting was conducted to assess two behavioural indices for each species: the monopolization index and the discovery ability index. Correlation analyses showed no evidence for the existence of a dominance-discovery trade-off. Furthermore, a positive correlation between the two indices was detected in some of the sampling sites. The dominance-discovery trade-off seems therefore to be just one of the possible mechanisms facilitating species coexistence in ant communities

Ergatandromorphism in the Ant Myrmica lobulicornis Nylander, 1857 (Formicidae: Myrmicinae)

Ergatandromorphism is the result of an aberrant development in which part of the body of a social insect shows the traits of the worker caste, while the other resembles a male. It is considered a specific case of gynandromorphism. Specimens with these characteristics have rarely been collected in different ant lineages across the world. Here, we provide the first description of ergatandromorphism in the ant Myrmica lobulicornis Nylander, 1857: an ergatandromorphous specimen was recovered during an arthropod sampling campaign across altitudinal and ecological gradients on the Italian Alps (Stelvio National Park), together with 480 workers and 4 queens of the same species, which expressed the normal phenotype

Social Parasite Ants in the Alps: a New Site of the Vulnerable Myrmica myrmicoxena and New Uppermost Altitudinal Limit for M. microrubra

We conducted a survey on the Alpine fauna of one of the largest Natural Park of the Italian Alps (Stelvio National Park) in the framework of a broad ecological monitoring of Alpine biodiversity. A two-years standardized sampling employing pitfall traps along a 1200 m altitudinal gradient led to the discovery of two interesting inquiline social parasite ants of the genus Myrmica: M. myrmicoxena Forel, 1895 and M. microrubra Seifert, 1993. Myrmica myrmicoxena, which is classified as Vulnerable according to the IUCN Red List, was so far known from only three sites across a narrow geographic range between Italy and Switzerland. Our data support the previous hypothesis over its ecology and host association. Myrmica microrubra is considered an incipient species of high evolutionary interest, sometimes regarded as an intraspecific form of M. rubra. While having a wide distribution in Europe, its presence in Italy was hitherto known only from a single site, and our record extends its altitudinal distribution limit in Europe upwards by about 600 m

A global database of ant species abundances

What forces structure ecological assemblages? A key limitation to general insights about assemblage structure is the availability of data that are collected at a small spatial grain (local assemblages) and a large spatial extent (global coverage). Here, we present published and unpublished data from 51, 388 ant abundance and occurrence records of more than 2,693 species and 7,953 morphospecies from local assemblages collected at 4,212 locations around the world. Ants were selected because they are diverse and abundant globally, comprise a large fraction of animal biomass in most terrestrial communities, and are key contributors to a range of ecosystem functions. Data were collected between 1949 and 2014, and include, for each geo-referenced sampling site, both the identity of the ants collected and details of sampling design, habitat type, and degree of disturbance. The aim of compiling this data set was to provide comprehensive species abundance data in order to test relationships between assemblage structure and environmental and biogeographic factors. Data were collected using a variety of standardized methods, such as pitfall and Winkler traps, and will be valuable for studies investigating large-scale forces structuring local assemblages. Understanding such relationships is particularly critical under current rates of global change. We encourage authors holding additional data on systematically collected ant assemblages, especially those in dry and cold, and remote areas, to contact us and contribute their data to this growing data set

Climate mediates the effects of disturbance on ant assemblage structure

Many studies have focused on the impacts of climate change on biological assemblages, yet little is known about howclimate interacts with other major anthropogenic influences on biodiversity, such as habitat disturbance. Using a unique global database of 1128 local ant assemblages, we examined whether climate mediates the effects of habitat disturbance on assemblage structure at a global scale. Species richness and evenness were associated positively with temperature, and negatively with disturbance. However, the interaction among temperature, precipitation and disturbance shaped species richness and evenness. The effectwas manifested through a failure of species richness to increase substantially with temperature in transformed habitats at low precipitation. At low precipitation levels, evenness increased with temperature in undisturbed sites, peaked at medium temperatures in disturbed sites and remained low in transformed sites. In warmer climates with lower rainfall, the effects of increasing disturbance on species richness and evenness were akin to decreases in temperature of up to 98C. Anthropogenic disturbance and ongoing climate change may interact in complicated ways to shape the structure of assemblages, with hot, arid environments likely to be at greatest risk. © 2015 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved

The role of permanent grasslands on ant community structure: ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) as ecological indicators in the agro-ecosystems of the Taro River Regional Park (Italy)

La rivista che ora ha il nome ufficiale Myrmecological News è citata in: Current Contents/Agriculture, Biology & Environmental Sciences; Google Scholar; Science Citation Index Expanded; Scopus; Zoological Record. Si tratta di una rivista emergente che avrà un Impact Factor ufficiale nel giugno 2012, con un valore stimato di oltre 2