PARENT SESSION
Poster Session #6: Invasive Species Ecology: Insects and wetlands.
Monday, August 5. Presentation from 5:00 PM to 6:30 PM. Exhibit Hall B & C, TCC
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Non-indigenous ants in the Florida Keys.
Forys, Elizabeth*,1, Allen, Craig2, Wojcik, Daniel3, 1 Environmental Studies, Saint Petersburg, FL2 U.S. Geological Survey, Biological Resources Division, Clemson, SC3 United States Department of Agriculture, Gainesville, FL
ABSTRACT- In the mid 1980s, an extensive survey of the ants of the Florida Keys found the highest proportion of non-indigenous ants in the United States (27 non-indigenous species out of 83 species total). Since the 1980s, habitat destruction and fragmentation in the Keys has continued with little respite. In the late 1990s we sampled the ant fauna of the Keys using 1,770 pairs of terrestrial and arboreal baits placed in 5 habitats types (beach berm, mangrove, salt marsh, hardwood hammock, pinelands, roadsides) on 14 keys. We identified 166,380 ants, comprising >45 species, including 12 species not been previously recorded in the Keys (8 native, 4 non-indigenous). More than half of the species captured were non-indigenous, accounting for >1/3 of the total number of individuals sampled. We collected the greatest number of non-indigenous species in hardwood hammocks and the greatest proportion of non-indigenous individuals was collected in salt marshes, indicating that non-native ants had successfully invaded these native ecosystems. Several of the most common non-indigenous species (e.g., Solenopsis invicta, Wasmannia auropunctata) are known to have significant impacts on native vertebrates and invertebrates (including other species of ants). Our results suggest a continuing trend of decreasing abundance and richness of native species and increasing abundance and richness of non-indigenous species. This trend likely reflects major anthropogenic alteration of most of the keys, and is itself likely to further degrade habitat quality and native diversity in the Keys.
KEY WORDS: non-indigenous, ants, invasive species, Florida Keys