The recovery of forest ecosystems relies on mutualistic interactions, particularly pollinators and seed-dispersers, or plant defenses by ants. A new modelling study on the succession and assembly of these interactions revealed an important role of non-obligate animal mutualists. Timo Metz performed computer simulations based on trait matching between mutualists, now …
Theory predicts that environmental filtering determines species assemblages – and their reassembly dynamics in a changing habitat such as a recovering rainforest. This prediction can be tested by studying trajectories of functional trait and phylogenetic composition. Phil Hoenle and coauthors examined 13 morphological traits from a total of 284 ant …
Species differ in their shape, morphology and function. But individuals within a species can be highly variable, too. Such variation likely results from responses to different environmetal conditions. Diego Marín-Armijos, Adolfo Chamba-Carrillo and Karen Pedersen (SP6) studied variation between individuals within a species, an Ecuadorian dung beetle. They compared individuals …
Do you know what “autohaemorrhaging” means? It is a deliberate release or ejection of blood (also termed reflex bleeding), reported from some lizards and snakes as well as some insects. It is often interpreted as defensive behavior against predator attacks. But whether reflex bleeding as a defense really works, and …
Our first analysis and paper on rainforest reassembly focuses on ants. During his PhD thesis, Phil Hoenle collected and identified a total of 283 ant species from litter, ground and tree trunks in 61 plots. The diversity was relatively high even in the agricultural sites, but ant community composition and …
Dung beetles are important secondary seed dispersers of mammal-dispersed plants in tropical forests – in our study site and worldwide. Beetles often bury the seeds that are included inside dung piles into the ground – if they are not too large in relation to the beetle. Beetles clean large seeds …
A spectacular new ant species has been discovered by Phil Hoenle – in the rainforest just behind the research station. The paper in ZooKeys describes this new species, Odonotomachus davidsoni – and accompanies the formal description for the first time with 3D images, making Museum specimen accessible to the public. …
Phil Hoenle discovered a new Strumigenys species in the study site. Within the large global ant genus Strumigenys, this species is a morphologically outlier with its long trap-jaw mandibles and smooth surface sculpturing. The species description in ZooKeys caught a lot of attention by the media: it was not only …
