Light trap transects – a field method for ascertaining the habitat preferences of night-flying Lepidoptera, using Mythimna turca (Linnaeus 1761) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) as an example

Spalding, Adrian; Parsons, Mark

doi:10.1023/b:jico.0000045816.88219.bf

Cited by 7 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…, 2004) and can thus permit comparison of catches (e.g. Spalding & Parsons, 2004; Littlewood et al. , 2006a).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Grazing impacts on moth diversity and abundance on a Scottish upland estate

Littlewood¹

2008

Insect Conserv Diversity

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Abstract. Livestock grazing is the most important direct management impact on grasslands in upland areas of the UK. For phytophagous species, such as Lepidoptera, the impact is primarily through grazing altering the species composition and structure of the vegetation. However, specific impacts related to different grazing regimes are not well understood for this group of insects. Within a replicated controlled grazing experiment, nocturnal adult moths were sampled by light trapping in the fifth year after establishment. Sampling effort was standardised between the four grazing treatments by simultaneously using identical traps in each treatment. The highest‐intensity grazing treatment produced the lowest moth abundance and species richness. Ungrazed and low‐intensity sheep grazing treatments produced the highest moth abundance and species richness. Moths that feed exclusively on graminoids and moths that overwinter as larvae were disproportionately well represented in the ungrazed treatment. A sub‐set of species for which large declines have recently been documented in the UK were most abundant in the ungrazed treatment. However, they made up the largest proportion of the overall assemblage in the high‐intensity grazing treatment. Increased grazing inversely affects moth abundance and species richness. However, effects are not even across all moth species. An absence of grazing is likely to negatively affect the abundance of some moths, especially those that overwinter in the egg stage.

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“…, 2004) and can thus permit comparison of catches (e.g. Spalding & Parsons, 2004; Littlewood et al. , 2006a).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Grazing impacts on moth diversity and abundance on a Scottish upland estate

Littlewood¹

2008

Insect Conserv Diversity

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“…The sampling order of sites within each rotation was controlled to account for the fraction of the moon illuminated (http://aa. usno.navy.mil/data/docs/MoonPhase.html) and to avoid any systematic bias from the well-documented influences of weather on light-trap captures (Fry & Waring 2001, Spalding & Parsons 2004, Yela & Holyoak 1997. Catches were also restricted to periods without strong moonlight by avoiding nine nights around the full moon (Yela & Holyoak 1997), and weather conditions were recorded every hour during sampling.…”

Section: Moth Samplingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Diversity and composition of Amazonian moths in primary, secondary and plantation forests

et al. 2009

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The response of tropical fauna to landscape-level habitat change is poorly understood. Increased conversion of native primary forest to alternative land-uses, including secondary forest and exotic tree plantations, highlights the importance of assessing diversity patterns within these forest types. We sampled 1848 moths from 335 species of Arctiidae, Saturniidae and Sphingidae, over a total of 30 trap-nights. Sampling was conducted during the wet season 2005, using three light-traps at 15 sites within areas of primary forest, secondary forest and Eucalyptus urograndis plantations in northern Brazilian Amazonia. The Jari study region provides one of the best opportunities to investigate the ecological consequences of land-use change, and this study is one of the first to examine patterns of diversity for a neotropical moth assemblage in a human-dominated landscape in lowland Amazonia. We found that the three moth families responded consistently to disturbance in terms of abundance and community structure but variably in terms of species richness, in a manner apparently supporting a life-history hypothesis. Our results suggest that secondary forests and Eucalyptus plantations can support a substantial level of moth diversity but also show that these forest types hold assemblages with significantly distinct community structures and composition from primary forest. In addition, the ability of these converted land-uses to support primary forest species may be enhanced by proximity to surrounding primary forest, an issue which requires consideration when assessing the diversity and composition of mobile taxa in human-dominated landscapes

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“…A ''no-pest strip'' (Hotshot, Newport Beach, California, USA) was placed in the bottom of each trap as a killing agent. Although not all species of insects are equally attracted to black light traps, we used these traps because we believe they are most suitable for catching nocturnal aerial insects, they are useful for making relative comparisons of insect abundance among sites, and they are known to have a relatively small capture radius in forested areas, congruent with the scale of our vegetation sampling (Ricketts et al, 2002;Spalding and Parsons, 2004). To minimize the influence weather conditions may have on insect captures, we did not sample on nights with precipitation or on nights where minimum temperatures were <5 8C.…”

Section: Insect Samplingmentioning

confidence: 99%