Changes in the dung beetle community in response to restinga forest degradation

Abstract

Restinga (forest formations on sandy substrates on the Brazil Atlantic coast) have declined from covering approximately 80 % of the coastline and continue to do so due to anthropogenic activity. This study compares the abundance, richness and species composition of conserved (CR) and degraded (DR) resting forest. We used six locations on the coast of Pernambuco, Brazil where there were paired CR and DR sites and used baited pitfall traps to sample dung beetles in the dry and wet seasons. We captured 1,724 individuals, which belonged to 25 species and 10 genera; 1,030 individuals (15 species) were from CR and 694 individuals (17 species) from DR. No significant differences was observed in the patterns of species richness or abundance between CR and DR sites but non-metric multidimensional scaling and similarity analyses revealed differences in species composition between CR and DR sites. Additionally DR sites had a higher beta diversity than CR sites. We found only seven of the 25 species identified in this study in both areas, indicating that few species from the original ecosystem remain in degraded sites. In addition, the forest species that were recorded in Degraded sites, such as Canthon nigripenne and Dichotomius schiffleri, had low abundance when compared to conserved restinga. We suggest that parts of the CR become areas under legal protection, in order to maintain the biodiversity of the remaining areas of restinga.

How Does Dung Beetle (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) Diversity Vary Along a Rainy Season in a Tropical Dry Forest?

“…In addition to having a paucity of studies in TDFs in general, most studies of dung beetles have evaluated spatial variation in β-diversity at the expense of studying temporal variation ( Viljanen et al 2010 , Costa et al 2014 , Silva and Hernández 2014 ). β-diversity can be decomposed into two process, turnover and nestedness.…”

New records of relictual populations of dung beetle species (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae) in the Atlantic Forest of the Brazilian Northeast

“…In the fragment of Muro Alto, Pernambuco, this species is rare, and was sampled in traps baited with feces in a conserved area. This was the only species from the genus Eurysternus reported in the study by Costa et al (2014), where it was treated as a morphospecies. ; transitional Atlantic Forest, pitfall with feces; CEUPE C2700.…”

“…Until the year 2000, 137 species had been recorded for this region (Vaz-de-Mello 2000). Since then, 26 studies have been published reporting data on this group from the region (Hernández 2003(Hernández , 2005(Hernández , 2007Lopes et al 2003Lopes et al , 2006Endres et al 2007;Silva et al 2007Silva et al , 2010Costa et al 2009Costa et al , 2013Costa et al , 2014Gillett et al 2010;Silva 2011;Filgueiras et al 2011aFilgueiras et al , 2011bLiberal et al 2011;Vieira and Silva 2012;Lima et al 2013;Mayer and Vasconcelos 2013;Medina and Lopes 2014;Filgueiras 2015; Pergentino 2015; Salomão and Iannuzzi 2015;Vieira et al 2017;Leite et al 2018;Salomão et al 2019). However, the lack of modern taxonomic studies for some genera and species groups holds back the understanding about dung beetle diversity in this region.…”