Perfecto Ivette, Vandermeer John
School for Environment and Sustainability University of Michigan Ann Arbor MI USA.
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology University of Michigan Ann Arbor MI USA.
Ecol Evol. 2020 Oct 27;10(23):12650-12662. doi: 10.1002/ece3.6785. eCollection 2020 Dec.
Agricultural ecosystems are by their very nature novel and by definition the more general biodiversity associated with them must likewise constitute a novel community. Here, we examine the community of arboreally foraging ants in the coffee agroecosystem of Puerto Rico. We surveyed 20 coffee plants in 25 farms three times in a period of one year. We also conducted a more spatially explicit sampling in two of the farms and conducted a species interaction study between the two most abundant species, and in the laboratory. We find that the majority of the most common species are well-known invasive ants and that there is a highly variable pattern of dominance that varies considerably over the main coffee producing region of Puerto Rico, suggesting an unusual modality of community structure. The distribution pattern of the two most common species, and , suggests strong competitive exclusion. However, they also have opposite relationships with the percent of shade cover, with showing a positive relationship with shade, while has a negative relationship. The spatial distribution of these two dominant species in the two more intensively studied farms suggests that young colonies of can displace . Laboratory experiments confirm this. In addition to the elaboration of the nature and extent of this novel ant community, we speculate on the possibilities of its active inclusion as part of a biological control system dealing with several coffee pests, including one of the ants itself, .
农业生态系统本质上是新颖的，根据定义，与之相关的更广泛的生物多样性同样必然构成一个新颖的群落。在此，我们研究了波多黎各咖啡农业生态系统中在树上觅食的蚂蚁群落。我们在一年内对25个农场的20株咖啡植株进行了三次调查。我们还在其中两个农场进行了空间上更明确的采样，并在实验室对两种数量最多的物种之间的物种相互作用进行了研究。我们发现，大多数最常见的物种是著名的入侵蚂蚁，并且在波多黎各主要咖啡产区存在高度可变的优势模式，这表明群落结构存在不寻常的模式。两种最常见的物种的分布模式表明存在强烈的竞争排斥。然而，它们与遮荫覆盖率的关系也相反，一种与遮荫呈正相关，而另一种呈负相关。在两个研究更深入的农场中，这两种优势物种的空间分布表明，某一种的年轻蚁群可以取代另一种。实验室实验证实了这一点。除了阐述这个新颖的蚂蚁群落的性质和范围外，我们还推测了将其积极纳入应对几种咖啡害虫（包括其中一种蚂蚁本身）的生物控制系统的可能性。
