Tropical leaf litter arthropods

Steve Yanoviak
Research - Litter Arthropods

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Arthropod diversity in terrestrial brown food webs (e.g., leaf litter) is likely to be a function of the local resource base over relatively long time scales. In an ongoing project (in collaboration with Dr. Michael Kaspari), I am testing the effects of edaphic properties on leaf litter quality and associated arthropod communities in western Amazonian forests. The mosaic of well-defined soil types present in this region provides a natural experiment to test the importance of such "bottom-up" effects. The first phase of the project examines existing patterns of diversity and species composition in litter communities of the region, and is nearly complete.

Aerial photo of deforestation over white sand (upper left) and clay (lower right) soils near Iquitos, Peru.

Forests on clay soils are cleared for agriculture and charcoal production, and clay is sometimes removed for use as compaction fill in road construction.

White sand forest is rapidly disappearing due to sand extraction for cement and other building products.

Field Methodology

A PVC frame is used to delineate a patch of litter for collection.

Litter is removed by hand...

...and placed in a sifter that separates fine litter (and arthropods) from the larger litter fragments.

After collection and sifting, arthropods are separated from the fine litter in a Tullgren funnel.

Page updated 1 April 2006

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