Interactions of juvenile Lumbricus terrestris with adults and their burrow systems in a two-dimensional microcosm

Pesquisa Agropecuária Brasileira

Niki Grigoropoulou¹  Kevin R. Butt¹  Christopher N. Lowe¹ 

[1] ,University of Central Lancashire School of Built and Natural Environment ,United Kingdom

关键词: anecic;    earthworm;    intraspecific interactions;    anécicas;    minhocas;    interações intraespecíficas;   

DOI  :  10.1590/S0100-204X2009000800025

来源: SciELO

【 摘 要 】

The objective of this work was to evaluate interactions of Lumbricus terrestris juveniles with adults and with inherited burrow systems. An experiment was set up using a two dimensional Evans' boxes microcosm. Adult L. terrestris were added to 16 boxes (one individual per box) and kept in darkness at 17ºC along with eight unoccupied boxes for two months. The adult L. terrestris were removed from eight randomly selected boxes, and L. terrestris juveniles were added (one juvenile per box), composing three treatments with eight replicates: 1, with an adult in an inherited burrow (ABJ); 2, alone in an inherited burrow (BJ); and 3, alone in a previously uninhabited box (J). The proportion of juveniles occupying adult burrows observed was significantly different in treatments ABJ (48%) and BJ (75%). The mean mass of juveniles at experimental termination differed significantly among treatments and was greater in treatment J (4.04±0.39 g) in comparison to the BJ (3.09±0.93 g) and ABJ treatments (2.13±0.64 g). Results suggest a negative influence of both the presence of an adult and its burrow system on juvenile growth. Intraspecific competition partially explained this, but further investigation is required to examine how an inherited environment (i.e. burrow) could negatively affect the growth of juveniles.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
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