NDLI: Invasive alien plants affect grassland ant communities, colony size and foraging behaviour

Content Provider	Springer Nature Link
Author	Lenda, Magdalena Witek, Magdalena Skórka, Piotr Moroń, Dawid Woyciechowski, Michał
Copyright Year	2013
Abstract	Ants are dominant members of many terrestrial ecosystems and are regarded as indicators of environmental changes. However, little is known about the effects of invasive alien plants on ant populations, particularly as regards the density, spatial distribution and size of ant colonies, as well as their foraging behaviour. We addressed these questions in a study of grassland ant communities on five grasslands invaded by alien goldenrods (Solidago sp.) and on five non-invaded grasslands without this plant. In each grassland, seven 100 m2 plots were selected and the ant colonies counted. Ant species richness and colony density was lower in the plots on the invaded grasslands. Moreover, both of these traits were higher in the plots near the grassland edge and with a higher number of plant species in the grasslands invaded by goldenrods but not in the non-invaded ones. On average, ant colony size was lower on the invaded grasslands than the non-invaded ones. Also, ant workers travelled for longer distances to collect food items in the invaded areas than they did in the non-invaded ones, even after the experimental removal of some ant colonies in order to exclude the effect of higher colony density in the latter. Our results indicate that invasive alien goldenrods have a profound negative effect on grassland ant communities which may lead to a cascade effect on the whole grassland ecosystem through modification of the interactions among species. The invasion diminishes a major index of the fitness of ants, which is a colony’s size, and probably leads to increased foraging effort of workers. This, in turn, may have important consequences for the division of labour and reproductive strategies within ant colonies.
Starting Page	2403
Ending Page	2414
Page Count	12
File Format	PDF
ISSN	13873547
Journal	Biological Invasions
Volume Number	15
Issue Number	11
e-ISSN	15731464
Language	English
Publisher	Springer Netherlands
Publisher Date	2013-04-27
Publisher Place	Dordrecht
Access Restriction	One Nation One Subscription (ONOS)
Subject Keyword	Biodiversity Edge effect Indicators Invasive alien species Plant species richness Ecology Freshwater & Marine Ecology Plant Sciences Developmental Biology
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Ecology Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics

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