Ant community change across a ground vegetation gradient in north Florida's longleaf pine flatwoods

Ant communities in longleaf pine habitats are poorly known and hence the naturally occurring ant assemblages of a large portion of southeastern North America are not well understood. This study examined the diverse ant community found in the longleaf pine flatwoods of north Florida and tested how ant diversity changes along a herbaceous ground cover gradient. Restoring the ground cover to its original floral composition is an important focus of longleaf pine conservation and hence it is important to understand how native faunal communities vary with ground cover variation. Using 4 sampling methods, we characterized the ant community and analyzed its within-habitat variation among 12 study sites. We found the highest plot species richness (55 species) and within-habitat species richness (72 species) ever recorded for North American ants. The ants formed three distinct communities. The low-diversity arboreal and subterranean assemblages varied little across forest stands while the diversity of the species-rich ground foraging ant community was negatively correlated with percent herbaceous cover. The imported fire ant, Solenopsis invicta Abbreviation: / ANF: Apalachicola National Fores

The global distribution of known and undiscovered ant biodiversity

Invertebrates constitute the majority of animal species and are critical for ecosystem functioning and services. Nonetheless, global invertebrate biodiversity patterns and their congruences with vertebrates remain largely unknown. We resolve the first high-resolution (~20-km) global diversity map for a major invertebrate clade, ants, using biodiversity informatics, range modeling, and machine learning to synthesize existing knowledge and predict the distribution of undiscovered diversity. We find that ants and different vertebrate groups have distinct features in their patterns of richness and rarity, underscoring the need to consider a diversity of taxa in conservation. However, despite their phylogenetic and physiological divergence, ant distributions are not highly anomalous relative to variation among vertebrate clades. Furthermore, our models predict that rarity centers largely overlap (78%), suggesting that general forces shape endemism patterns across taxa. This raises confidence that conservation of areas important for small-ranged vertebrates will benefit invertebrates while providing a “treasure map” to guide future discovery.The Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Postdoctoral Fellowships for Foreign Researchers Program, Japan Ministry of the Environment, Environment Research, and Technology Development Fund no. 4-1904, the Leverhulme Trust, the National Science Foundation, Australian Research Discovery Grant, Foundational Biodiversity Information Programme (South Africa), and the USDA and NIFA support of the Mississippi Entomological Museum.https://www.science.org/journal/sciadvam2023Zoology and Entomolog

Sex ratio expression in ants: Empirical studies with Aphaenogaster rudis

This work introduces the use of a Bayesian logistic regression model for analyzing ant sex ratio data and presents empirical research investigating sex ratio expression in Aphaenogaster rudis. The analytical method can be used to test how explanatory variables influence sex ratio expression and to produce estimates of population level sex ratios that are more accurate than those previously obtained using other methods. ^ My empirical research is designed to explain how environmental factors influence sex ratio expression. A review of A. rudis\u27 biology and natural history shows that certain characteristics of this species, such as its stable social structure, make this ant an ideal study system for this work. ^ My field and laboratory experiments showed that A. rudis colonies did not alter their sex ratio when provided with supplemental food. This lack of a treatment response contrasts with findings from a similar A. rudis study and contradicts predictions of numerous resource based sex ratio models. The observed sex ratios were consistent with worker control of sex allocation. ^ A two year observational study showed that the sex ratios did not differ between two A. rudis field populations. There was a large change in the sex ratios between years and the changes were similar in both populations. In 2002 the sex ratio (0.67, female investment) fell between the values predicted under queen control (0.50) and worker control (0.75) of sex allocation. In 2003 investment was highly female biased (0.87). The observed year-to-year difference, occurring across two populations and showing similar changes, was putatively caused by weather variation. ^ Overall these results show that while sex ratio expression in ants can at times agree with predicted theoretical values, we also commonly find substantial variation in expression within a species when we examine multiple years and/or multiple populations. Understanding the causes and evolutionary implications of this variation in sex ratio expression remains as an important challenge for sex ratio researchers.

A new species of the ant genus <i>Bothriomyrmex</i> Emery, 1869 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) from the Caribbean region

Bothriomyrmex enigmaticus sp. nov. is described from the island of Hispañola based on one nest collection. This is the first collection of the genus Bothriomyrmex (Emery, 1869) from the Caribbean region, and the second species to be described from the Americas. While sharing several characters with B. paradoxus (Dubovikoff &amp; Longino, 2004) from Costa Rica and Honduras, B. enigmaticus sp. nov. diverges in several key characters, including palp formula. However, a morphometric comparison to Palearctic species of the tribe Bothriomyrmecini suggests affinities to B. paradoxus, Chronoxenus wroughtoni (Forel, 1895) of the eastern Palearctic, and to a lesser extent an undescribed species of Arnoldius (Dubovikoff, 2005) from Australia and B. corsicus (Santschi,1923) of the western Palearctic.</p

A new species of the ant genus Bothriomyrmex Emery, 1869 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) from the Caribbean region

Bothriomyrmex enigmaticus sp. nov. is described from the island of Hispañola based on one nest collection. This is the first collection of the genus Bothriomyrmex (Emery, 1869) from the Caribbean region, and the second species to be described from the Americas. While sharing several characters with B. paradoxus (Dubovikoff & Longino, 2004) from Costa Rica and Honduras, B. enigmaticus sp. nov. diverges in several key characters, including palp formula. However, a morphometric comparison to Palearctic species of the tribe Bothriomyrmecini suggests affinities to B. paradoxus, Chronoxenus wroughtoni (Forel, 1895) of the eastern Palearctic, and to a lesser extent an undescribed species of Arnoldius (Dubovikoff, 2005) from Australia and B. corsicus (Santschi,1923) of the western Palearctic

A new species of the ant genus Bothriomyrmex Emery, 1869 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) from the Caribbean region

Bothriomyrmex enigmaticus sp. nov. is described from the island of Hispañola based on one nest collection. This is the first collection of the genus Bothriomyrmex (Emery, 1869) from the Caribbean region, and the second species to be described from the Americas. While sharing several characters with B. paradoxus (Dubovikoff & Longino, 2004) from Costa Rica and Honduras, B. enigmaticus sp. nov. diverges in several key characters, including palp formula. However, a morphometric comparison to Palearctic species of the tribe Bothriomyrmecini suggests affinities to B. paradoxus, Chronoxenus wroughtoni (Forel, 1895) of the eastern Palearctic, and to a lesser extent an undescribed species of Arnoldius (Dubovikoff, 2005) from Australia and B. corsicus (Santschi,1923) of the western Palearctic

A taxonomic revision of the Strumigenys nitens and simulans groups (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), two Caribbean radiations of leaf litter ants

Booher, Douglas B., Prebus, Matthew, Lubertazzi, David (2019): A taxonomic revision of the Strumigenys nitens and simulans groups (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), two Caribbean radiations of leaf litter ants. Zootaxa 4656 (2): 335-358, DOI: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4656.2.