Effect of canopy density on litter invertebrate community structure in pine forests

Abstract

Abstract We investigated the structure of the litter invertebrate community in 141 pine (Pinus sylvestris Linnaeus, 1753) forest sites with five variants of canopy density (30-44, 45-59, 60-74, 75-89 and 90-100%) in the steppe zone of Ukraine. The total number of litter macrofauna specimens collected at each site decreased from an average of 84/100 trap-days in the sparsest stands (30-40% density) to 4-39 specimens/100 trap-days in the forests with a denser canopy. The number of macrofauna species caught in the pitfall traps does not vary significantly with different degrees of canopy density. The Shannon-Weaver and Pielou diversity indexes show increases corresponding to increasing stages of canopy density. The average share of phytophages in the trophic structure of the litter macrofauna does not vary with canopy density. The relative number of saprophages decreases from 54% in the forests with the sparsest canopy to 11-13% in the forests with denser canopies. The relative number of saprophages in pine forests (22%) is lower than that in deciduous forests (40%). The share of zoophages in the trophic structure of the litter macrofauna increases significantly with the increase in the pine forest canopy density (from 21% in the sparsest plots to 59% in the densest). The relative number of polyphages is highest (47-65%) when the canopy density is 45-89%. At canopy densities below or above this range, the share of polyphages in the community decreases to 20 and 24%, respectively. Regardless of canopy density, Formicidae and Lycosidae invariably rank amongst the first three dominant families. Nine families of invertebrates dominate in the pine forest stands with the highest density (90-100%), and 5-7 families dominate in the stands with lower density. For the pine forest litter macrofauna, we have observed an extreme simplification of the community size structure compared with natural and planted deciduous forests of the steppe zone of Ukraine.