Formicid fauna of contrasting tropical rainforest agro-ecosystem and their environmental implications

Abstract

The pitfall technique was used to study ants in a secondary re-growth forest and a fallow plot a thePermanent Site of Nnamdi Azikwe Awka from January to December, 1998. The selected envronmental variables including mean soil temperature, mean relative humidity and rainfall. Species of ant obtained from the two sampling stes were Acantholepsis sp. Camponotus acvapimensis, C. perrisi, Myrmicariastriata, C. maculatus, Dorylus affinis Paratrechina sp., Megaponera foetans, Pheidole sp. Crematogaster sp. and Oecophylla longinoda. Statistical differences existed only in the distribution ofCamponotus acvapimensis and C. perrisi with less catches recorded at the forest than the fallow pot. There was positive correlation coefficient between the density of Dorylus affinis and mean soil temperature (r = 0.84) at the forest while at the fallow plot negative correlaton value (r= -0.61) was obtaned between the popuation densiy of Acantholepsis sp. Populations of Acantholepsis also recorded a positive correlation (r = 0.54) with monthly mean soil temperature and mean relative humidity. These results do not only suggest a reflection o response o these ant species to these environmental variables during their foraging activities but their implications during the exploratory activities o these ants carried out in relation to temporal organization of the foraging systems, with these ants species exhibiting cenrifugal polytheism associated with ant soceties. The environmental implications o the trapping of these formicid speces in the habitats studied were also discussed.

Keywords: Formicid fauna, Tropical rainforest, Agro-ecosystem, Environmental variables

Animal Research International Vol. 4 (2) 2007 pp. 666-672