Current Science

Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access

Quantitative Inventories of Ants from India:Gaps, Prospects and Recommendations


Affiliations
1 Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Royal Enclave, Srirampura, Jakkur Post, Bengaluru 560 064, India
 

India is regarded as one of the highly diverse but data-deficient regions in terms of ant diversity. Despite a number of studies, patterns in diversity of ants in India are still unclear. Through a review of recent Indian studies based on samples of ground dwelling ants, we highlight reasons that may underestimate diversity and hinder comparisons. This study shows that recent developments in sampling ant assemblages and analysis of the data have not sufficiently ischolar_mained in India. In addition, several geographic areas are still under-explored and need further attention. Therefore, it is important that future inventories adapt methods that facilitate comparison of data. In this regard, we provide results that reiterate some of the important developments in designing effective inventories for ants. The appraisal of data through such methods is expected to improve the knowledge about Indian ant fauna and its distribution.

Keywords

Ant Sampling, ALL-Protocol, Arunachal Pradesh, Inventory of Ants.
User
Notifications
Font Size

  • Dunn, R. R., Guenard, B., Weiser, M. D. and Sanders, N. J., Geographic gradients. In Ant Ecology (eds Lach, L., Parr, C. L. and Abbott, K. L.), Oxford University Press, New York, 2010, pp. 38–59.

  • Sanders, N. J., Lessard, J. P., Fitzpatrick, M. C. and Dunn, R. R., Temperature, but not productivity or geometry, predicts elevational diversity gradients in ants across spatial grains. Global Ecol. Biogeogr., 2007, 16, 640–649.

  • Bruhl, C., Eltz, T. and Linsenmair, K., Size does matter–effects of tropical rainforest fragmentation on the leaf litter ant community in Sabah, Malaysia. Biodivers. Conserv., 2003, 12, 1371–1389.

  • Kaspari, M., O’Donnell, S. and Kercher, J., Energy, density, and constraints to species richness: ant assemblages along a productivity gradient. Am. Nat., 2000, 155, 280–293.

  • Agosti, D., Majer, J., Alonso, L. and Schultz, T., In Ants: Standard Methods for Measuring and Monitoring Biodiversity, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC, 2000.

  • Fisher, B., Improving inventory efficiency: a case study of leaf-litter ant diversity in Madagascar. Ecol. Appl., 1999, 9, 714–731.

  • Olson, D. M., A comparison of the efficacy of litter sifting and pitfall traps for sampling leaf litter ants (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) in a tropical wet forest, Costa Rica. Biotropica, 1991, 23, 166–172.

  • Agosti, D. and Alonso, L., The ALL protocol: a standard protocol for the collection of ground-dwelling ants. In Ants: Standard Methods for Measuring and Monitoring Biodiversity (eds Agosti, D. et al.), Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC, 2000, pp. 204–206.

  • Longino, J. T., Coddington, J. and Colwell, R. K., The ant fauna of a tropical rain forest: estimating species richness three different ways. Ecology, 2002, 83, 689–702.

  • Dunn, R. R. et al., Climatic drivers of hemispheric asymmetry in global patterns of ant species richness. Ecol. Lett., 2009, 12, 324–333.

  • Dunn, R. R., Sanders, N. J., Fitzpatrick, M. C., Laurent, E., Lessard, J. P. and Agosti, D., Global ant (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) biodiversity and biogeography – a new database and its possibilities. Myrmecol. News, 2007, 10, 77–83.

  • Fisher, B. L., Biogeography. In Ant Ecology (eds Lach, L., Parr, C. L. and Abbott, K. L.), Oxrord University Press, New York, 2010, pp. 18–37.

  • Bharti, H., Guénard, B., Bharti, M. and Economo, E. P., An updated checklist of the ants of India with their specific distributions in Indian states (Hymenoptera, Formicidae). ZooKeys, 2016, 551, 1–83.

  • Bestelmeyer, B. T., Agosti, D., Alonso, L. E., Brandao, C., Brown, W., Delabie, J. H. and Silvestre, R., Field techniques for the study of ground-dwelling ant: an overview, description, and evaluation. In Ants: Standard Methods for Measuring and Monitoring Biodiversity (eds Agosti, D. et al.), Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC, 2000, pp. 122–144.

  • Magurran, A., How many species? In Measuring Biological Diversity, Blackwell Science Ltd, Malden, MA, 2004, pp. 72–98.

  • Chao, A., Colwell, R. K., Lin, C.-W. and Gotelli, N. J., Sufficient sampling for asymptotic minimum species richness estimators. Ecology, 2009, 90, 1125–1133.

  • Holldobler, B. and Wilson, E., The Ants, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1990.

  • Bingham, T., The fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma. In Hymenoptera, Ants and Cockoo-Wasps, Taylor and Francis, London, 1903, Vol. 2.

  • Soberon, J. and Llorente, J., The use of species accumulation functions for the prediction of species richness. Conserv. Biol., 1993, 7, 480–488.

  • Colwell, R. K. and Coddington, J. A., Estimating terrestrial biodiversity through extrapolation. Philos. Trans. R. Soc. Lond., B, Biol. Sci., 1994, 345, 101–118.

  • Gotelli, N. J. and Colwell, R. K., Quantifying biodiversity: procedures and pitfalls in the measurement and comparison of species richness. Ecol. Lett., 2001, 4, 379–391.

  • Gotelli, N. J., Ellison, A. M., Dunn, R. R. and Sanders, N. J., Counting ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae): biodiversity sampling and statistical analysis for myrmecologists. Myrmecol. News, 2011, 15, 13–19.

  • Longino, J. T. and Colwell, R. K., Density compensation, species composition, and richness of ants on a neotropical elevational gradient. Ecosphere, 2011, 2, 1–20.

  • Bharti, H. and Sharma, Y. P., Diversity and abundance of ants along an elevational gradient in Jammu-Kashmir Himalaya-I. Halteres, 2009, 1, 10–24.

  • Bharti, H., Sharma, Y. P., Bharti, M. and Pfeiffer, M., Ant species richness, endemicity and functional groups, along an elevational gradient in the Himalayas. Asian Myrmecol., 2013, 5, 79–101.

  • Parui, A. K., Chatterjee, S. and Basu, P., Habitat characteristics shaping ant species assemblages in a mixed deciduous forest in Eastern India. J. Trop. Ecol., 2015, 31, 267–280.

  • Holdingstone, K. and Hajong, S. R., Seasonal patterns in ant (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) activity in a forest habitat of the West Khasi Hills, Meghalaya, India. Asian Myrmecol., 2013, 5, 103–112.

  • Narendra, A., Gibb, H. and Ali, T. M., Structure of ant assemblages in Western Ghats, India: role of habitat, disturbance and introduced species. Insect Conserv. Diver., 2010, 4, 132–141.

  • Ellison, A. M., Record, S., Arguello, A. and Gotelli, N. J., Rapid inventory of the ant assemblage in a temperate hardwood forest: species composition and assessment of sampling methods. Environ. Entomol., 2007, 36, 766–775.

  • Wheeler, Q. D. and McHugh, J. V., A portable and convertable ‘Moczarski/Tullgren’ extractor for fungus and litter coleoptera. Coleopts. Bull., 1987, 4, 9–12.

  • Reese, G. C., Wilson, K. R. and Flather, C. H., Performance of species richness estimators across assemblage types and survey parameters. Global Ecol. Biogeogr., 2014, 23, 585–594.

  • Greenslade, P., Sampling ants with pitfall traps: digging-in effects. Insect. Soc., 1973, 20, 343–353.

  • Longino, J. T., What to do with the data. In Ants: Standard Methods for Measuring and Monitoring Biodiversity (eds Agosti, D., Majer, J., Alonso, L. and Schultz, T.), Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC, 2000, pp. 186–203.

  • Sabu, T. K., Shiju, R. T., Vinod, K. V. and Nithya, S., A comparison of the pitfall trap, Winkler extractor and Berlese funnel for sampling ground-dwelling arthropods in tropical montane cloud forests. J. Insect. Sci., 2011, 11, 1–19.

  • Jerdon, T., A catalogue of the species of ants found in southern India. J. Nat. Hist., 1854, 13, 100–110.


Abstract Views: 298

PDF Views: 110




  • Quantitative Inventories of Ants from India:Gaps, Prospects and Recommendations

Abstract Views: 298  |  PDF Views: 110

Authors

Aniruddha Marathe
Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Royal Enclave, Srirampura, Jakkur Post, Bengaluru 560 064, India
Priyadarsanan Dharma Rajan
Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Royal Enclave, Srirampura, Jakkur Post, Bengaluru 560 064, India

Abstract


India is regarded as one of the highly diverse but data-deficient regions in terms of ant diversity. Despite a number of studies, patterns in diversity of ants in India are still unclear. Through a review of recent Indian studies based on samples of ground dwelling ants, we highlight reasons that may underestimate diversity and hinder comparisons. This study shows that recent developments in sampling ant assemblages and analysis of the data have not sufficiently ischolar_mained in India. In addition, several geographic areas are still under-explored and need further attention. Therefore, it is important that future inventories adapt methods that facilitate comparison of data. In this regard, we provide results that reiterate some of the important developments in designing effective inventories for ants. The appraisal of data through such methods is expected to improve the knowledge about Indian ant fauna and its distribution.

Keywords


Ant Sampling, ALL-Protocol, Arunachal Pradesh, Inventory of Ants.

References





DOI: https://doi.org/10.18520/cs%2Fv114%2Fi04%2F861-867