Programa de Pós-graduação em Ecologia, Univ Federal da Bahia, Salvador, BA, Brasil.
Centro de Ecologia e Conservação Animal, Univ Católica do Salvador, Salvador, BA, Brasil.
Neotrop Entomol. 2021 Feb;50(1):32-45. doi: 10.1007/s13744-020-00824-4. Epub 2021 Jan 26.
As large amounts of natural environments are lost due to urbanization, the role of remnant native vegetation in the preservation of biodiversity has become even more significant. Remnant native forest patches are essential refugia for flora and fauna and are crucial for the maintenance of ecosystem processes in urbanized landscapes. We evaluated the influence of landscape structure on ants and spiders associated with Atlantic Forest remnants in urban landscapes. We sampled 14 forest areas in the Metropolitan Region of Salvador and tested the effect of the landscapes' proportion of forest cover, mean landscape isolation, and mean landscape shape complexity on the taxonomic and functional richness and the community composition of both groups. The species collected were classified into functional groups based on behavioral attributes and environmental preferences. Overall, there were strong adverse effects of forest loss, decreased connectivity, and an increase in edge effects associated with the mean shape complexity of the forest remnants. However, the spiders responded to all three landscape structure characteristics whereas the ants only responded to the landscape mean shape complexity. Our findings indicate that the maintenance of urban forest habitats is essential for the conservation of biodiversity in the Metropolitan Region of Salvador and the preservation of ecological functions performed by species within the forest areas.
由于城市化导致大量自然环境丧失，残余原生植被在保护生物多样性方面的作用变得更加重要。残余原生森林斑块是动植物的重要避难所，对于维持城市景观中的生态系统过程至关重要。我们评估了景观结构对与大西洋森林残余物相关的蚂蚁和蜘蛛的影响。我们在萨尔瓦多大都市区采样了 14 个森林区，并测试了景观中森林覆盖率、平均景观隔离度和平均景观形状复杂性对两组分类和功能丰富度以及群落组成的影响。收集到的物种根据行为特征和环境偏好分为功能组。总的来说，森林损失、连通性降低以及与森林残余物平均形状复杂性相关的边缘效应增加对物种产生了强烈的不利影响。然而，蜘蛛对所有三种景观结构特征都有反应，而蚂蚁只对景观平均形状复杂性有反应。我们的研究结果表明，维持城市森林生境对于保护萨尔瓦多大都市区的生物多样性以及保护森林区域内物种所发挥的生态功能至关重要。
