Increasing deforestation worldwide has expanded the interfaces between fragmented forests and non-forest habitats. Human-made edges are very different from the original forest cover, with different microclimatic conditions. Conversely, the natural transitions (i.e., ecotones) are distinct from human-made forest edges. The human-made forest edges are usually sharp associated with disturbances, with abrupt changes in temperature, humidity, luminosity and wind incidence towards the forest interior. However, the natural forest-lake ecotones, even when abrupt, are composed of a complex vegetal physiognomy, with canopy structures close to the ground level and a composition of herbaceous and arboreal species well adapted to this transition range. In the present study, fruit-feeding butterflies were used as models to investigate whether faunal assemblages in natural ecotones are more similar to the forest interior than to the anthropic edges. Butterflies were sampled monthly over one year in the Rio Doce State Park, Southeastern Brazil, following a standardized design using a total of 90 bait traps, in three different forest habitats (forest interior, forest ecotone and anthropic edges), in both canopy and understory. A total of 11,594 individuals from 98 butterfly species were collected (3,151 individuals from 79 species in the forest interior, 4,321 individuals from 87 species in the ecotone and 4,122 individuals from 83 species in the edge). The results indicated that the butterfly richness and diversity were higher in transition areas (ecotones and edges). The ecotone included a combination of butterfly species from the forest interior and from anthropic edges. However, species composition and dominance in the ecotone were similar to the forest interior in both vertical strata. These results suggest that human made forest edges are quite distinct from ecotones. Moreover, ecotones represent unique habitats accommodating species adapted to distinct ecological conditions, while anthropic edges accommodate only opportunistic species from open areas or upper canopies.

Urban forest fragments, such as parks and squares provide food resources, shelter, and favorable conditions for the maintenance of butterflies. This study provides an inventory of butterflies and observations of plants visited by adults in a small urban park, the Américo Renê Giannetti Municipal city park, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais State. We sampled an area of 18. Resumo: Fragmentos urbanos de mata, como parques e praças, oferecem recursos alimentares, sobretudo abrigo e condições favoráveis para a permanência de borboletas. Este estudo fornece um inventário de borboletas e também a observação das plantas visitadas por indivíduos adultos em um pequeno parque urbano, Parque Municipal Américo Renê Giannetti, Belo Horizonte, estado de Minas Gerais. Amostrou-se uma área de 18,2 ha no período de dezembro/2006 à dezembro/2007, com o auxilio de rede entomológica e armadilhas com frutos fermentados. Foram registrados 165 indivíduos de 78 espécies, distribuídos nas seguintes famílias: Nymphalidae -46 spp., Hesperiidae -10 spp., Lycaenidae -sete spp., Pieridae -sete spp., Riodinidae -cinco spp. e Papilionidae -três spp. Entre as plantas visitadas observou-se que a com maior atratividade foi Lantana camara (Verbenaceae), um arbusto com flores de cores vibrantes, destacada como fonte usual de néctar e pólen. As borboletas encontradas indicaram a importância da manutenção de áreas verdes urbanas, proporcionando condições favoráveis para a permanência de borboletas, mesmo em ambientes antrópicos. Palavras-chave: inventário, interação inseto-planta, conservação de borboletas, mata urbana, Lantana camara.

Ants, an ecologically successful and numerically dominant group of animals, play key ecological roles as soil engineers, predators, nutrient recyclers, and regulators of plant growth and reproduction in most terrestrial ecosystems. Further, ants are widely used as bioindicators of the ecological impact of land use. We gathered information of ant species in the Atlantic Forest of South America. The ATLANTIC ANTS data set, which is part of the ATLANTIC SERIES data papers, is a compilation of ant records from collections (18,713 records), unpublished data (29,651 records), and published sources (106,910 records; 1,059 references), including papers, theses, dissertations, and book chapters published from 1886 to 2020. In total, the data set contains 153,818 ant records from 7,636 study locations in the Atlantic Forest, representing 10 subfamilies, 99 genera, 1,114 ant species identified with updated taxonomic certainty, and 2,235 morphospecies codes. Our data set reflects the heterogeneity in ant records, which include ants sampled at the beginning of the taxonomic history of myrmecology (the 19th and 20th centuries) and more recent ant surveys designed to address specific questions in ecology and biology. The data set can be used by researchers to develop strategies to deal with different macroecological and region‐wide questions, focusing on assemblages, species occurrences, and distribution patterns. Furthermore, the data can be used to assess the consequences of changes in land use in the Atlantic Forest on different ecological processes. No copyright restrictions apply to the use of this data set, but we request that authors cite this data paper when using these data in publications or teaching events.

This paper provides a preliminary inventory of the Lepidoptera from the Sempre Vivas National Park, a mountain area (1200 to 1400 m a.s.l.) that combines savannas (Cerrado) and open rocky montane fields (campos rupestres) in the north-central region of Minas Gerais, Brazil. Collections were made by active search using nets and Van Someren-Rydon bait traps in two periods: one from 2010 to 2011 (10 sampling days) and the other from 2018 to 2019 (20 sampling days). A total of 1181 individuals of 238 species were sampled, distributed in 18 subfamilies of six Lepidoptera families. Noteworthy were the records of Rhetus belphegor (Westwood, [1851) (Riodinidae), Magnastigma julia (Lycaenidae), and Strymon ohausi (Spitz, 1933) (Lycaenidae), species included in the BrazilianRed List of threatened Lepidoptera. Five species endemic to the Cerrado biome were reported, namely Cogia cerradicola (Mielke, 1967) (Hesperiidae), Parides bunichus diodorus (Hopffer, 1866) (Papilionidae), Nhambikuara cerradensis Freitas, Barbosa & Zacca, 2018, Yphthimoides cipoensis Freitas, 2004 (Nymphalidae), and Sertania jaibensis (Callagham & Soares, 2001) (Riodinidae). Although preliminary, the information presented here is important for the management of the Sempre Vivas National Park and contributes to a crucial body of data to support actions for the conservation of the Cerrado biome in Brazil.

Plants adapted to different habitats exhibit differences in functional traits and these characteristics are in uenced by soil properties. We tested the hypothesis that soil resource availability in uences the functional traits of plants, affecting therefore herbivory levels. We examined three Byrsonima plant species with different life forms that occurred across a distinct edaphic habitat along the Doce River Basin, South-eastern Brazil. We characterize habitats according to soil nutrient concentration and measured functional characteristics of crown architecture, leaf nutrients, sclerophylly, leaf area and leaf density. In addition, we evaluated how these variables in uenced herbivory levels of congeneric plants.Our data have shown that species along a gradient of soil nutrients have functional characteristics in uenced by habitat, which in turn affected herbivory levels. By comparing species from different life forms but within the same genus along a stress-gradient of continuous habitats, we described a corresponding gradient of plant functional traits and tissue consumption by herbivorous insects.