Rainforest conversion to rubber and oil palm reduces abundance, biomass and diversity of canopy spiders

PeerJ

article

Daniel Ramos¹  Tamara R. Hartke¹  Damayanti Buchori²  Nadine Dupérré⁴  Purnama Hidayat³  Mayanda Lia³  Danilo Harms⁴  Stefan Scheu¹  Jochen Drescher¹ 

[1] Department of Animal Ecology, J.-F. Blumenbach Institute for Zoology and Anthropology, University of Göttingen;Center for Transdisciplinary and Sustainability Sciences, IPB University;Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, IPB University Bogor;Center for Taxonomy and Morphology, Zoological Museum Hamburg, Leibnitz Institute for the Analysis of Biodiversity Change;Center for Biodiversity and Sustainable Land Use, Georg-August Universität Göttingen

关键词: Agriculture;    Deforestation;    Cash crops;    Land use change;    Southeast Asia;    Araneae;    Jambi;    Biodiversity;    Indonesia;    EFForTS;   

DOI  :  10.7717/peerj.13898

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Inra

【 摘 要 】

Rainforest canopies, home to one of the most complex and diverse terrestrial arthropod communities, are threatened by conversion of rainforest into agricultural production systems. However, little is known about how predatory arthropod communities respond to such conversion. To address this, we compared canopy spider (Araneae) communities from lowland rainforest with those from three agricultural systems in Jambi Province, Sumatra, Indonesia, i.e., jungle rubber (rubber agroforest) and monoculture plantations of rubber and oil palm. Using canopy fogging, we collected 10,676 spider specimens belonging to 36 families and 445 morphospecies. The four most abundant families (Salticidae N = 2,043, Oonopidae N = 1,878, Theridiidae N = 1,533 and Clubionidae N = 1,188) together comprised 62.2% of total individuals, while the four most speciose families, Salticidae (S = 87), Theridiidae (S = 83), Araneidae (S = 48) and Thomisidae (S = 39), contained 57.8% of all morphospecies identified. In lowland rainforest, average abundance, biomass and species richness of canopy spiders was at least twice as high as in rubber or oil palm plantations, with jungle rubber showing similar abundances as rainforest, and intermediate biomass and richness. Community composition of spiders was similar in rainforest and jungle rubber, but differed from rubber and oil palm, which also differed from each other. Canonical Correspondence Analysis showed that canopy openness, aboveground tree biomass and tree density together explained 18.2% of the variation in spider communities at family level. On a morphospecies level, vascular plant species richness and tree density significantly affected the community composition but explained only 6.8% of the variance. While abundance, biomass and diversity of spiders declined strongly with the conversion of rainforest into monoculture plantations of rubber and oil palm, we also found that a large proportion of the rainforest spider community can thrive in extensive agroforestry systems such as jungle rubber. Despite being very different from rainforest, the canopy spider communities in rubber and oil palm plantations may still play a vital role in the biological control of canopy herbivore species, thus contributing important ecosystem services. The components of tree and palm canopy structure identified as major determinants of canopy spider communities may aid in decision-making processes toward establishing cash-crop plantation management systems which foster herbivore control by spiders.

【 授权许可】

CC BY