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Human-induced wildfires are increasing in frequency in tropical forests, and their deleterious consequences for biodiversity include decreases in seed rain, which may be affected directly by fire or indirectly by the creation of edges between forest and non-forest environments. Understanding seed rain is key to assess the potential for natural regeneration in plant communities. We assessed the impact of fire and fire-created edges on seed rain species richness, abundance, size, weight, and dispersal syndromes in Atlantic Forest remnants in Bahia, Brazil. We assessed seed rain at monthly intervals for an entire year along seven 300 m-long transects placed perpendicular to the edge. We installed seed traps at the edge and at 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, and 150 m into the burnt area and into the forest from forest edge. We recorded a total of 9,050 seeds belonging to 250 morphospecies. We did not observe edge influence; however, we detected a lower abundance and proportion of animal-dispersed seeds in the burnt than in the unburnt areas. The seed abundance in the burnt areas was lower and seeds were smaller and lighter than those in the unburnt area. Seed rain in the burnt area was not greater near to the forest than far from it. The abundance and richness of seed rain was positively correlated with tree density. Our findings highlight the lack of seed rain in burnt areas and differences in community composition between the burnt and unburnt areas. Collectively, these results indicate negative consequences on natural regeneration, which can lead to permanent secondarization and challenges for early regeneration of burnt areas, which will initially have impoverished forests due to low seed richness.

Anthropogenic land use and cover changes impact biodiversity worldwide. However, ecological groups are differently affected by landscape composition and configuration. Understanding which groups are negatively affected and which thrive in human-modified landscapes is of paramount importance for conservation management, especially for species such as the frugivorous birds, which play an essential role in seed dispersal. We evaluated the relative importance of landscape composition and configuration, explaining taxonomic and functional diversity and their effects on frugivorous birds in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. We used a robust dataset encompassing 153 forest fragments in the Atlantic Forest hotspot. We classified species as frugivores based on the percentage of fruits in the diet, and used functional traits related to seed dispersal to measure functional diversity. Our results showed that landscape composition was more important than landscape configuration explaining taxonomic and functional diversity of frugivorous birds. In addition, the interaction between landscape composition and configuration explained the loss of functional traits. We demonstrate a disproportional importance of landscape composition explaining taxonomic and functional diversity of frugivorous birds, whereas the traits related to seed dispersal were explained by both compositional and configurational variables. Thus, we highlighted the need to maintain high habitat amount to increase taxonomic and functional diversity of frugivorous birds. However, the interaction of landscape composition and configuration is of paramount importance to sustain functional traits of frugivores in tropical forest landscapes.

Made available in DSpace on 2021-06-25T10:31:29Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2021-01-01 Tropical forests are being lost and modified at an unprecedented rate, with extant biodiversity increasingly restricted to human-modified landscapes. Resulting changes in landscape structure are shaping diversity patterns, with features such as habitat amount, edge density, and matrix quality determining species persistence. We assessed the importance of landscape composition (forest amount and matrix composition) and configuration (edge density) on diversity patterns of aerial insectivorous bats in Brazilian Atlantic Forest landscapes. We sampled 40 sites in two nearby sub-regions, one contained more forest cover and shade cacao plantations while the other was less forested and dominated by pastures. Based on echolocation calls, we detected 17 sonotypes that could be attributed to at least 13 species belonging to three families. The two sub-regions comprised bat assemblages similar in species richness but different in species composition and activity levels (a surrogate for abundance). Whereas species richness was not influenced by landscape structure at the largest spatial scale of study, activity levels were shaped by changes in landscape composition and configuration, with different responses for forest and open-area foragers. Decreasing activity of forest foragers was the most evident response of bat diversity to landscape structure at different spatial scales. Given the value of this biological group for key ecosystem services such as pest control, our findings highlight the importance of considering regional landscape features for management and prediction of future scenarios of anthropization. Institute of Biology Federal University of Bahia, R. Barão de Jeremoabo 668, Ondina Biology Department Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco, R. Manuel de Medeiros 97, Dois Irmãos Applied Conservation Ecology Lab Programa de Pós-Graduação Ecologia e Conservação da Biodiversidade Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz, Rodovia Ilhéus-Itabuna, km16, Salobrinho Spatial Ecology and -Conservation Lab (LEEC) Ecology Department São Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A, Bela Vista Spatial Ecology and -Conservation Lab (LEEC) Ecology Department São Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A, Bela Vista

Habitat loss is widely recognized as the main driver of biodiversity loss around the globe, yet the effects of habitat fragmentation on biodiversity have been extensively debated in recent years. We used a robust dataset of medium and large-sized mammals to test (a) the Habitat Amount Hypothesis, which postulates that species richness can be mainly predicted by the total amount of habitat surrounding the sampling site, and (b) the effects of habitat fragmentation per se, which may be expected to be weak or mainly positive on species richness. We compiled information on the occurrence of mammal species in 166 forest fragments across the Atlantic Forest. For each forest fragment, we extracted information on patch size, percentage of forest cover (a proxy for habitat amount), and edge density and number of fragments (fragmentation metrics). We related these metrics to mammalian richness considering separately for all species, forest-dependent species, disturbance-tolerant species, and different trophic guilds. All richness measures strongly declined with decreasing forest cover, yet were unaffected by patch size, number of patches and edge density. The only exception occurred with herbivore richness, which was affected by number of patches. However, we found fragmentation per se effects only for herbivore richness. Our results show that mammal richness increased with habitat amount at the landscape, whereas habitat fragmentation per se had significant negative impacts on herbivores only. We therefore recommend maintaining highly forested landscapes and restoring severely deforested areas, being essential for ensuring high richness of mammals.

A combination of bibliometric and science mapping methods was carried out to explore characteristics of scientific production on the application of orbital remote sensing in fire ecology. The performance analyzes made it possible to identify the main actors responsible for the knowledge (authors, institutions and countries) and the journals selected for dissemination. Through co-occurrence and co-authorship networks we analyze the temporal evolution of knowledge, analyzing the emergence of themes and research methods, in addition to the pattern of interaction between the main actors involved. The research universe consisted of articles published in indexed journals at Scopus. Of the 2602 initial articles identified, 1977 articles were selected and a subsample of 1832 was selected for the period 2000–2019. As a result, we found that the production of articles started in 1973 and increased over time, with great expansion from 2000s, when different themes, tools and techniques were identified. Corroborating these results, we observed keywords networks more complex and richer in themes, tools and techniques in the period 2000–2019. On the topics surveyed, in the most recent period, there was a greater frequency of subjects such as risk, regime, history and severity. These topics are generally investigated based on data on active fire and global burnt area, which is why the articles most cited in the literature mostly dealt with techniques for obtaining these estimates. Regarding those responsible for research, we demonstrate that although scientific knowledge is concentrated in a few geographical centers and institutions, there are high scientific partnerships and cooperation.

Made available in DSpace on 2021-06-25T11:10:46Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2021-01-01 Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) Recent studies have characterized the influence of agroecosystems on biodiversity. However, a set of components associated with the management of these areas is still neglected in landscape-level studies, especially in areas of recent agricultural intensification. The resources and conditions provided by agroecosystems to different species are highly variable in space and time, and failing to account for this variation may lead to misleading conclusions about the biodiversity status in these environments. In this perspective, we provide a conceptual overview to highlight why and which landscape components still need to be better explored to provide an adequate assessment of the agroecosystem effects on biodiversity. We used a Brazilian heterogeneous intensive-farming landscape as an example to outline the components that we believe are important for understanding biodiversity patterns in such landscapes. An in-depth description of agroecosystems can help us create better landscape-level management strategies and to design more effective green-way policies. Laboratório de Genética & Biodiversidade Instituto de Ciências Biológicas Universidade Federal de Goiás Spatial Ecology Lab Institute of Biology Federal University of Bahia Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab (LEEC) Department of Biodiversity São Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A, 1515, Bela Vista Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ecologia e Manejo de Recursos Naturais Universidade Federal do Acre Instituto de Estudos Sociombientais - IESA Universidade Federal de Goiás Instituto Federal de Goiás Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab (LEEC) Department of Biodiversity São Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A, 1515, Bela Vista

The future of tropical forest biodiversity will largely depend on human-modified landscapes. We investigated how medium- to large-bodied mammals respond to factors at local (habitat type), intermediate (land use heterogeneity, forest cover and human population density) and large spatial scales (overall forest cover) in agroforestry landscapes. We surveyed mammals using camera traps in traditional cacao agroforests (cabrucas), intensified cacao agroforests, and forest remnants within two large Atlantic Forest landscapes of southern Bahia, Brazil, representing both high and low forest cover. At the local scale, habitat types differed in their potential to harbour mammal species, with forest remnants and cabrucas showing high conservation value, mainly under contexts of high forest cover, whereas intensified cacao agroforests contained less diversified species assemblages in both landscapes. At intermediate scales, species richness increased with increasing forest cover around forest remnants and intensified cacao agroforests, but the opposite was observed in cabrucas. The effects of human population density were ubiquitous but species-dependent. At the largest scale, species richness was higher in the most forested landscape, highlighting the imperative of maintaining forest remnants to retain forest-dwelling mammals in human-dominated landscapes. We claim that mammal conservation strategies require a multi-scale approach and that no single strategy is likely to maximize persistence of all species. Some species can routinely use traditional agroforests, and a large fraction of mammal diversity can be maintained even if high canopy-cover agroforestry dominates the landscape. Nevertheless, forest patches and highly forested landscapes are essential to ensure the persistence of forest-dwelling and game species.

Some species are more affected than others by edge effects resultant from habitat loss and fragmentation, generally due to human activities. As these specific responses depend on biophysical and behavioral traits of organisms, it is expected that the occurrence of species with particular traits will vary between fragment edges and interiors. Edges are also known to often harbor many invasive species. We performed a meta-analysis of the responses of insect species with different life history traits to anthropogenic edges, focusing on the species’ behavioral characteristics and whether they are considered invasive or not. We systematically searched the Web of Science database for papers on this subject published until May 2018. We examined response ratios for 712 comparisons of anthropogenic edge effects on insects. As expected, the responses differed according to the traits evaluated. Soil-foraging and social insects were negatively affected by anthropogenic edges. Conversely, flying and invasive species were favored by edges. Our analyses suggest that edges, by differently affecting different insect groups, have an important role in structuring local insect communities. Finally, the importance of functional traits in studies of edge effects must be highlighted.

Although fire occurrence plays a central role in the dominance of the super-dominant bracken fern Pteridium arachnoideum in Neotropical forests, it is unclear whether this applies to the Brazilian savanna (Cerrado), which vegetation is naturally adapted to fire. We assessed fire effects on the aboveground biomass of P. arachnoideum in the Cerrado Ecological Reserve in Central Brazil. We measured frond height, density, standing biomass, and litter biomass before and for two years following a prescribed fire, and also sampled a control site to control for other mortality events and for seasonal variation. The average P. arachnoideum frond height and aboveground biomass decreased over three times in the burnt site 18 months after the fire. The frond density decreased both in the burnt and control site, indicating that this may have been caused in another way than by fire. Conversely, litter biomass decreased shortly after the fire in the burnt site, but returned to pre-fire levels in one year. Possible explanations for the lasting negative effects of fire on the height and biomass of P. arachnoideum include the implementation of the prescribed fire early in the dry season, which likely limited immediate clonal regrowth, and the herbivory by leaf-cutting ants. Nevertheless, the effective clonal growth of P. arachnoideum apparently precluded the fire from having stronger effects and hence this species was not excluded from the site. We conclude that direct and indirect fire effects may cause the decline of P. arachnoideum in Cerrado, so that prescribed fires may be applied as a management strategy in Cerrado sites where this species is super-dominant, ideally in combination with other control measures.

Invasive grasses are an important threat in tropical savannas and grasslands and may be affected by natural and anthropogenic features of the environment. They may affect native species at a variety of scales, but a spatially explicit assessment of their effects is lacking. We studied the spatial pattern of native and invasive graminoids in Brazilian cerrado in southeastern Brazil and assessed the effects of vegetation type, elevation, and edges. We sampled native grasses, native sedges, and two invasive grass species (Urochloa decumbens and Melinis minutiflora) along three 301- to 1334-m-long transects encompassing grassland, forest, and savanna. We used wavelet transforms, generalized additive models, and null model simulations for analysis. Invasive grasses were mostly found in open vegetation. Neither native nor invasive species were consistently affected by elevation or edges. Much of the spatial variation could be explained by small-scale autocorrelation, but M. minutiflora had a more heterogeneous pattern than U. decumbens. Invasive grasses were negatively related to native ones at a variety of scales, from 1 to 66 m, and we observed both positive and negative relations between the two invasive species, with positive ones a finer scales. We hypothesize that spatial pattern characteristics of different invasive species may be related to their invasion potential.

This paper compares procedures and results of tests as per different methodologies. It highlights the specifics of foam behavior under various types of loading, as well as presents newly developed test procedure for foams to be applied in layered structures made of polymeric composite materials (PCM).

Although certain clonal species are often overdominant in disturbed tropical ecosystems, it is often unclear how this success is related to their patterns of clonal growth and how they respond to abiotic heterogeneity. Here we describe ramet growth and survival in an overdominant Neotropical bracken fern (Pteridium arachnoideum) and assess how these patterns resemble congeneric species and are affected by canopy closure in a savanna–riparian forest transition in southeastern Brazil. We measured frond length from early emergence to senescence during two consecutive years in three clonal patches dominated by P. arachnoideum and associated the resulting growth pattern with the local canopy closure. Pteridium arachnoideum exhibited average frond length and growth rate higher than previously reported for this species and for congeneric species. Frond mortality was generally high shortly after emergence from the ground, but was also much higher in one study site due to ant herbivory. Fronds of P. arachnoideum were higher, showed petiole elongation and higher mortality rate under high canopy closure, suggesting shading avoidance, in contrast to the shade tolerance reported for Pteridium aquilinum. Although our findings indicate that this species is unlikely to represent a threat to the biodiversity of undisturbed Brazilian savanna–riparian forest transitions with continuous canopy, they also suggest that introduction of fast growing tree species with dense canopy may accelerate the restoration of more disturbed and degraded sites.

Conversion of natural to anthropogenic environments affects biodiversity, and the understanding of these impacts may be improved by assessing how different functional groups respond to such land conversion. We studied land conversion impacts on ant functional groups, as ants are ecologically important and respond well to various environmental changes. We hypothesized that conversion of natural to anthropogenic environments modifies the composition of functional groups, fostering generalist and opportunistic groups over specialist ones, with more responses of this type in tropical than in temperate regions. We recovered 412 papers from ISI Web of Science, of which we selected 17 studies, published between 1993 and 2018, that addressed our study’s question. We assessed whether each functional group responded positively or negatively to conversion of natural habitat into anthropogenic land uses and used Monte Carlo tests to assess significance. Ants were affected by natural habitat conversion into monoculture and polyculture and by the conversion of savannas and of tropical and subtropical forests. Land conversion affected six of the 13 functional groups assessed here. In the temperate zone, cryptic species, predators, subordinate Camponotini, cold-climate specialists and tropical-climate specialists were impaired, whereas hot-climate specialists were favored. In the tropics, land conversion negatively impacted fungus-growers and predators. In both climatic zones, several functional groups, mainly those with broad ecological niches, did not respond to land conversion. Our results corroborate that land conversion effects vary among ant functional groups and indicate that the ant fauna of temperate ecosystems may be more susceptible than that of tropical regions.

Ants, an ecologically successful and numerically dominant group of animals, play key ecological roles as soil engineers, predators, nutrient recyclers, and regulators of plant growth and reproduction in most terrestrial ecosystems. Further, ants are widely used as bioindicators of the ecological impact of land use. We gathered information of ant species in the Atlantic Forest of South America. The ATLANTIC ANTS data set-which is part of the ATLANTIC SERIES data papers-is a compilation of ant records from collections (18,713 records), unpublished data (29,651 records), and published sources (106,910 records; 1059 references), including papers, theses, dissertations, and book chapters published from 1886 to 2020. In total, the data set contains 153,818 ant records from 7,636 study locations in the Atlantic Forest, representing 10 subfamilies, 99 genera, 1,114 ant species identified with updated taxonomic certainty, and 2,235 morphospecies codes. Our data set reflects the heterogeneity in ant records, which include ants sampled at the beginning of the taxonomic history of myrmecology (the nineteenth and twentieth centuries) and more recent ant surveys designed to address specific questions in ecology and biology. The data set can be used by researchers to develop strategies to deal with different macroecological and regional-wide questions, focusing on assemblages, species occurrences and distribution patterns. Furthermore, the data can be used to assess the consequences of changes in land use in the Atlantic Forest on different ecological processes. No copyright restrictions apply to the use of this data set, but we request that authors cite this data paper when using these data in publications or teaching events.

The current demand for studies on ants in general and their communities in particular has exponentially increased during the last decades. Much has already been said about ant sampling techniques, but we attempt to present a critical approach to the different available methods for sampling ants, their limitations, and their complementarity. We focus on sampling methods for ant inventories; entire ant colony sampling for a range of purposes, such as behavioral, cytogenetic, or population studies; and ant community studies. Methods presented here are valid for both tropical and temperate regions taking into account that ants are essentially thermophilous and found in lower richness and abundance in cold regions or during cold seasons. Sampling depends on the stratum of interest. Thus, different methods, or a combination of them, may be selected for soil-, litter-, or vegetation-associated ants. Regardless of the method used, some considerations must always be taken into account. The first of these is compatibility of data between the sampling methods. Be they pitfall traps, Winkler sack samples, or whatever, such sampling units must be treated independently from each another; otherwise the inferential statistics used may not be valid or used with caution as violation of independence may occur in two non-mutually exclusive general forms: pseudoreplication and spatial (or temporal) autocorrelation, for example, which are common mistakes in ant studies. We provide recommendations for statistical approaches to the data and different suggestions of analyses that can be used for the different kinds of data taken with ants.

Made available in DSpace on 2020-12-12T01:30:24Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2020-06-01 Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) Deforestation can compromise ecological processes and biotic interactions, including the host–parasite relationship. While some parasites infect only one host, others require multiple hosts to complete their complex life cycles. In this context, different parasites may have different demands and traits and may have specific responses to habitat degradation. Here, we tested whether forest cover has different effects on different frogs' parasites, as chytrid (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis; Bd) and helminths (Platyhelminthes and Nematoda). We collected data on two stream frog species (Crossodactylus caramaschii and Crossodactylus schmidti) from nine sites in the Brazilian Atlantic forest, with forest cover ranging from 20% to 99%. Bd presence and load increased with decreasing forest cover, but the opposite was observed for nematodes. Load of monoxenous and heteroxenous helminths increased with forest cover. We suggest that variations in potential host diversity, microclimate conditions, and host immune response may be responsible for the contrasting patterns found for micro-(Bd) and macroparasites (helminths, except Platyhelminthes). Our work brings evidence of how habitat reduction can affect host–parasite relationships, including infection with the pathogen responsible for hundreds of global species extinctions. Instituto de Biologia Universidade Federal da Bahia, Campus de Ondina Laboratório Multiusuário de Bioacústica (LMBio) e Laboratório de História Natural de Anfíbios Brasileiros (LaHNAB) Departamento de Biologia Animal Instituto de Biologia Universidade Estadual de Campinas Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ecologia Instituto de Biologia Universidade Estadual de Campinas Setor de Parasitologia Instituto de Biologia Universidade Estadual de São Paulo/UNESP, Rua Professor Doutor Antônio Celso Wagner Zanin, s/n Instituto de Ciências Agrárias UFU – Universidade Federal de Uberlândia, LMG-746, Km 1 Setor de Parasitologia Instituto de Biologia Universidade Estadual de São Paulo/UNESP, Rua Professor Doutor Antônio Celso Wagner Zanin, s/n FAPESP: 020/00099-0 CNPq: 150041/2017-9 FAPESP: 2013/21519-4 FAPESP: 2014/23388-7 FAPESP: 2016/25358-3 FAPESP: 2016/50377-1 CNPq: 300896/2016-6 CNPq: 302589/2013-9 CNPq: 309125/2017-0 CNPq: 313241/2018-0 CNPq: 405285/2013-2 CNPq: 438675/2016-9 CNPq: 440496/2015-2

Notwithstanding impacts of marine debris on fauna by ingestion and suffocation, little is known about debris-related behavior. Lytechinus variegatus is a common sea urchin known for its covering behavior. We hypothesized that L. variegatus would select more marine debris (i.e. litter) than natural material as cover and we also expected that the selected natural and artificial material would be different in weight, sizes and transparency. We haphazardly collected marine debris and natural material on 20 individuals of L. variegatus and on the bottom, around each individual. All sampled material was weighed, measured and classified regarding opacity, nature (natural or artificial). Our results showed that i) sea urchins picked more litter than natural objects, ii) proportional weight of litter carried by urchins was significantly larger than expected by chance, iii) when considering all objects (on urchins and on the bottom) litter was heavier, wider and less opaque than natural material and iv) litter carried by the urchins were wider and less opaque than natural material. We suggest that litter can influence urchin's protection against sunlight, camouflage and ballast and that sea urchins with covering behavior might be used as indicators of marine debris in coastal and deep waters.

In mangroves the habitat fragmentation has contributed to area reduction and increased edge extension, as well as other anthropogenic consequences that can change abiotic conditions, interfere with ecosystem functioning and lead to the loss of biodiversity. These impacts may affect terrestrial and marine invertebrates living in this coastal system. This study investigated the effects of fragment characteristics (size and matrix type) and distance to edge on ant richness, occurrence of functional groups and of the most frequent species in mangroves in North-Eastern Brazil. Our research covered ten mangrove fragments. We used sardine and honey baits in twelve randomly selected points per area. Twenty-five species of ants were recorded, with Camponotus arboreus, Crematogaster erecta, Azteca sp. and Neoponera villosa being the most frequent. Only four functional groups were found, the most representative of which were the Arboreal Omnivores with Massive Recruitment and the Generalist Predators. No relationship was found between the response variables and the environmental characteristics. Mangroves ants are mostly arboreal; thus, the pattern of competition between ant species or even tree architecture elements may have stronger effects than those related to anthropization, loss of area and fragmentation in this environment. Furthermore, the harsh physical conditions in the mangrove serve as barriers for most exotic species and to some functional groups of ants. This study highlights the natural restrictive nesting and foraging conditions in mangrove areas as the powerful forces in ant community structuring, possibly even more than anthropization itself.

The expansion of human activities has led to drastic changes in the original landscapes in which tropical forests stand, causing the loss and fragmentation of natural habitats. Both processes induce changes in forest structure and local microclimatic conditions that are important modulators of the survival and demographic structure of plant species. The Neotropical palm Euterpe edulis Mart. (Arecaceae) is a keystone species largely consumed by several animals. Nevertheless, such emblematic species has also been over-harvested for palm-heart extraction, which led it to be currently classified as vulnerable to extinction. Understanding the main predictors affecting its persistence in forest remnants is essential for proposing strategies to modify this current scenario. In this context, we aimed to investigate how processes occurring in two different spatial scales (i.e. forest cover at the landscape scale and local microclimatic conditions) affect the demographic structure of E. edulis. We selected 20 forest fragments along the Brazilian Atlantic Forest in southern Bahia, embedded within landscapes ranging from 10 to 98% of forest cover amount. In each fragment, a plot of 100 × 50 m was established and all individuals of E. edulis were counted. A datalogger was also deployed in the center of the fragment to collect data of air temperature and relative local humidity. We used a zero-altered negative binomial regression (ZANB) to investigate the influence of forest cover and microclimate variables on the demographic structure of E. edulis. A total of 6528 individuals distributed in the five ontogenetic stages was recorded, with Juveniles presenting the highest number of individuals. Forest cover, not microclimate, was the best predictor of the demographic structure for all ontogenetic stages. We suggest that deforested areas are also more prone to palm harvest, which might explain the pervasive effects on the species persistence. We strongly recommend the maintenance and restoration of forest areas to ensure the maintenance of current populations of this endangered palm species. Yet due to the species overexploitation, reintroducing the species to already depleted fragments is urgently required along the Atlantic coast, combined with an increase in surveillance and environmental education programs to curb illegal extraction in highly deforested areas.

Edge influence is one of the main impacts in fragmented landscapes; yet, most of studies on edge influence have focused on high-contrast edges, and the impacts of low-contrast edges and narrow linear openings are less understood. Edge influence often affects bird nest predation, but these effects are not ubiquitous and may depend on characteristics such as nest height and visibility. We performed an experiment on nest predation in a migratory passerine, Elaenia chiriquensis (Lesser Elaenia; Passeriformes: Tyrannidae), in a savanna vegetation of the Brazilian Cerrado biome in South-Eastern Brazil. We used 89 real E. chiriquensis nests, collected during previous reproductive seasons, with two plasticine eggs in each, and randomly distributed them at two locations (edge – up to 20 m from a firebreak edge and interior – approx. 150–350 m from the edge) and two heights (low – 60–175 cm and high – 190–315 cm above ground). We also measured leaf and branch density around each nest. We performed this study on two 15-days campaigns, checking the nests every 2–3 days and removing those with predation marks. We sorted the predation marks into those made by birds, mammals, or unidentified predators, and used generalized linear models to assess the effects of location, height and leaf density on survival time and predator type. Only four nests had not been predated during the experiment; 55 nests were predated by birds, 7 by mammals, and 23 by unidentified predators. Low nests in the interior tended to have larger survival times whereas high nests at the edge tended to be more predated by birds and less predated by mammals. Thus, even a low-contrast (firebreak) edge may significantly increase nest predation, which is also affected by the nest's height, mainly due to predation by birds. These effects may be due to predator movement along the edge as well as to edge-related changes in vegetation structure. We suggest that higher-contrast edges which may also be used as movement conduits, for example powerline openings, may have even stronger effects, demanding further studies.

Summary Maintaining connectivity is one of the main challenges for biodiversity conservation world-wide. Ecological corridors are important to maintain landscape connectivity, but their efficiency depends on landscape patterns and species responses at different spatial extents and landscape contexts. We developed a new ecologically oriented free software package, LandScape Corridors (lscorridors), to improve ecological corridor design by considering biodiversity responses to landscape attributes at a variety of spatial extents. LandScape Corridors considers stochastic variation, species perception and landscape influence on organisms in the design of ecological corridors. In addition to the least cost path algorithm, we propose four different methods for the simulation of multiple-path functional ecological corridors. One method uses the information for each pixel separately, whereas the three other methods permit corridor simulation considering the landscape context at different spatial extents. LandScape Corridors permits to simulate corridors for species with different requirements and considers that different species perceive and respond to the surrounding landscape in different ways, as many species may choose to move through areas that may not be the most permeable ones in the landscape. Two parameters in lscorridors modulate the stochasticity in corridors simulations. The first parameter is the level of variability added to the input resistance map in each simulation, resulting in more variable and spatially spread-out corridors. The other parameter is the spatial extent that may influence each pixel; larger extents result in larger spatial zones affecting each pixel during corridors simulations. In addition, when considering spatial influence, the simulations may be performed for species highly, medially or less sensitive to habitat quality. Some currently available software are not free or depend on a paid GIS software to work. In addition, some software do not support large matrices in their simulations, limiting their use. LandScape Corridors is designed to deal with large rasters, is based on strictly freeware software, and is freely available online. This allows the users to implement new methods for modelling multi-scale and ecologically based corridors. LandScape Corridors is a potential tool for the identification of protected areas, as corridor simulation considers species movement and landscape connectivity, essential characteristics to aid in large-scale biodiversity conservation, especially in anthropogenic landscapes. LandScape Corridors provides what we may call a zone for conservation, showing a set of connected areas in the landscape which may be ordered according to their potential for ecological corridors or which may be used as an aid for conservation strategies or ecological restoration projects.

Made available in DSpace on 2018-12-11T17:30:08Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2016-12-01 Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) The Edge Influence is one of the most pervasive effects of habitat fragmentation, as many forest remnants in anthropogenic landscapes are within 100�m of edges. Forest remnants may also affect the surrounding anthropogenic matrix, possibly resulting in a matrix–edge–remnant diversity gradient for some species groups. We sampled dung beetles in 15 agricultural landscapes using pitfall traps placed along transects in matrix–edge–remnant gradients. The remnants were a native savanna-like vegetation, the cerrado, and the matrix was composed of three human-dominated environments (sugarcane, eucalyptus, pasture). More species were observed in cerrado remnants than in adjacent land uses. Dung beetles were also more abundant in the cerrado than in the landscape matrix of sugarcane and eucalypt, but not of pasture. Dung beetles were severely affected by anthropogenic land uses, and notwithstanding their high abundance in some land uses such as pasture, the species richness in these areas tended to be smaller than in the cerrado remnants. We also found that the influence of the edge was evident only for abundance, particularly in landscapes with a pasture matrix. However, this land use disrupts the species composition of communities, indicating that communities located in cerrado and pasture have a distinct species composition, and that both communities are affected by edge distance. Thus, anthropogenic land uses may severely affect dung beetles, and this impact can extend to communities located in cerrado remnants as well as to those in matrices, with possible consequences for ecological processes such as decomposition and nutrient cycling. Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab (LEEC) Ecology Department S�o Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A Post Graduation Program in Ecology National Institute of Amazon Research – INPA, Av. Andr� Ara�jo Applied Ecology and Conservation Lab Biological Science Department State University of Santa Cruz UESC, Rodovia Ilh�us-Itabuna, km 16 Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab (LEEC) Ecology Department S�o Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A FAPESP: 2013/50421-2 CNPq: 312045/2013-1

Insect herbivory has been observed to be affected by habitat loss and fragmentation, although the mechanisms by which these anthropogenic disturbances affect this process are not well understood. To aid in clarifying this issue, we assessed the relation between forest cover and leaf damage caused by herbivorous insects on a representative tropical forest understory plant family, the Rubiaceae. We measured leaf area loss of Rubiaceae plants in 20 forest sites located in the Brazilian Atlantic forest, and also tested whether variation in forest cover, abundance of insectivorous birds (predators) and of Rubiaceae plants (resources) could explain the observed variation in leaf damage. Herbivory levels varied between 2.6 and 12.5 percent leaf area lost and increased with decreasing forest cover, whereas the other explanatory variables did not provide additional explanatory power. Therefore, forest loss appears to be the main driver of changes in local herbivory, and ecological processes such as top-down and bottom-up control may not account for the deforestation-related increase in herbivory levels. Other mechanisms, for example leaf quality and/or the influence of the adjoining land uses, have to be explored in future studies.

Edge influence, characterized by differences in ecosystem characteristics between the edge and the interior of remnants in fragmented landscapes, affects a variety of organisms and ecosystem processes. An important feature that may be affected by edges is the amount of plant litter, which provides important habitat for a large variety of organisms and influences ecological processes such as fire dynamics. We studied edge influence on plant litter and fine woody debris in the cerrado of Sao Paulo state, south-eastern Brazil. We collected, sorted, dried and weighed plant litter along 180 m-long transects perpendicular to three savanna and eleven forest edges adjacent to different anthropogenic land uses, with four to five transect per edge. There tended to be less biomass of the finer portions of fine woody debris at both savanna and forest edges. Graminoid litter at savanna edges was greater than in the corresponding interior areas, whereas other litter portions were either unaffected by edges or did not show consistent patterns in either savanna or forest. Edge influence was usually restricted to the first 20 m from the edge, was not influenced by edge characteristics and exhibited no clear differences between savanna and forest areas. Several mechanisms may have led to the variable patterns observed including variation in the plant community, plant architecture, and invasive species. The edge-related variation in plant litter may putatively lead to, for example, increased fire frequency and intensity at the savanna edges and altered trophic dynamics at forest edges; the mechanisms and consequences of this edge influence should be addressed in future studies.

Habitat loss represents one of the main threats to tropical forests, which have reached extremely high rates of species extinction. Forest loss negatively impacts biodiversity, affecting ecological (e.g., seed dispersal) and genetic (e.g., genetic diversity and structure) processes. Therefore, understanding how deforestation influences genetic resources is strategic for conservation. Our aim was to empirically evaluate the effects of landscape-scale forest reduction on the spatial genetic structure and gene flow of Euterpe edulis Mart (Arecaceae), a palm tree considered a keystone resource for many vertebrate species. This study was carried out in nine forest remnants in the Atlantic Forest, northeastern Brazil, located in landscapes within a gradient of forest cover (19-83%). We collected leaves of 246 adults and 271 seedlings and performed genotyping using microsatellite markers. Our results showed that the palm populations had low spatial genetic structure, indicating that forest reduction did not influence this genetic parameter for neither seedlings nor adults. However, forest loss decreased the gene flow distance, which may negatively affect the genetic diversity of future generations by increasing the risk of local extinction of this keystone palm. For efficient strategies of genetic variability conservation and maintenance of gene flow in E. edulis, we recommend the maintenance of landscapes with intermediary to high levels of forest cover, that is, forest cover above 40%.

When an area previously used for agricultural or sylvicultural purposes is abandoned, it may undergo natural regeneration. However, the outcome of such regeneration depends on a number of factors, including the presence of non-native invasive plants, and, when production forests such as eucalypt plantations are considered, remaining non-native trees may also affect the natural regeneration possibilities. We studied how remaining eucalypt trees affect woody species regeneration and invasive grasses in an abandoned Eucalyptus grandis plantation in a regenerating Brazilian savanna site. We sampled the woody vegetation and invasive grasses in 30 8 × 8-m plots and surveyed the eucalypt trees within these plots and in 3 m-wide strips around them. Eucalypts negatively affected the cover of the C4 invasive African grass Melinis minutiflora and the total abundance and basal area of native woody plants in general and of two dominant species, suggesting an overall negative effect on native plant regeneration notwithstanding the also negative effects on African grasses. Conversely, they had no effect on species richness, species diversity nor mean height of woody plant communities nor on the abundance of three other dominant native woody species. Interestingly, a low eucalypt abundance had small effects on native woody species but much stronger effects on the cover of M. minutiflora, possibly due to shading. Thus, our results indicate that remaining eucalypt trees may hamper the natural regeneration of native woody plants, but also suggest that maintaining a low density of eucalypt trees may be a cost-effective strategy, given the high costs associated with the complete removal of remaining trees and the difficulties in controlling invasions by African grasses.

Land-use change is considered the greatest threat to biodiversity worldwide. As such, identifying the drivers that shape biological communities is crucial for enhancing conservation strategies in human-modified tropical landscapes. We used a hybrid patch-landscape design and a multi model inference approach to assess the relative impacts of forest loss, increased edge density and increased pasture cover on dung beetle functional groups in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest – a biodiversity hotspot. Our findings provide novel empirical evidence showing that edge density can be a major driver for dung beetles when compared to forest and pasture cover at the landscape scale. However, forest and pasture cover also influenced some dung beetle responses, supporting the idea that biological communities are negatively affected by habitat loss and changes in land cover. We found that dung beetle body size, protibia area and metatibia length were all larger in landscapes with increased edge density, reinforcing the need for further studies exploring which mechanisms could favour the presence of larger dung beetles in fragmented tropical landscapes. Taken together, these results suggest the need of conservation and management strategies focused on the protection of the remaining Atlantic Forest fragments, and the promotion of forest recovery and reduction in the pasture cover and edge density at the landscape-level.

The severity of fire impacts on fire-prone vegetation is often spatially heterogeneous, and may lead to small-scale patchiness in the structure of plant populations by affecting mortality, topkill, and reproduction. This patchiness, however, is not usually taken into account in fire ecology studies. We show that a dry-season fire may result in small-scale patchiness in the population structure of the common shrub Miconia albicans, mostly by differential topkill and resprouting. We related fire severity to population structure parameters of the study species and assessed the effects of fire on its soil seed bank. Basal area of non-woody live stems and of dead stems increased with fire severity, whereas that of woody live stems decreased, indicating topkill and resprouting. However, there was no relationship between fire severity and the total number of live or dead plants, showing that mortality in the fire was low. We found very few seedlings, indicating that resprouting, not germination from the soil seed bank, is the main recovery strategy of this species. The fire also affected the soil seed bank, as there were fewer seedlings emerging from soil collected in burned patches. Although this study was performed with a single species, it is likely that other species, especially those with basal resprouting, will show similar patterns of post-fire patchiness in population structure. This patchiness, in turn, may affect the spatial distribution of future fires, and should be taken into account in studies of fire ecology.

Anthropogenic fires have strong impacts in tropical rainforests that are not necessarily restricted to the burnt areas, as edge influence from the burnt patch may significantly alter the unburnt vegetation. Conversely, the remaining forest patches may mitigate changes in microclimate in the adjacent burnt areas. We studied variation in air and soil temperature in burnt and unburnt areas in the Atlantic forest of southern Bahia, Brazil. In November-December 2017, approx. two years after a series of wildfires, we sampled six transects at three burnt-unburnt edges, placing soil and temperature data loggers at the edge and at 20, 60, and 120 m into the burnt and unburnt areas and keeping them there for seven days. One data logger of each pair was buried at a depth of 3 cm and the other was kept at a height of 1 m above ground in a protective case. Air in the burnt area was cooler than in the forest at night and warmer in the morning, whereas soil was cooler than in the forest at night and early morning and warmer in the afternoon. We did not observe gradients in air or soil temperature, but soil temperature was more variable in the burnt area than in the unburnt forest. Conversely, notwithstanding the differences between diurnal and noctural temperatures, daily average, minimum and maximum air temperature varied little between the environments, possibly due to shading by bracken fern in the burnt areas. The variation in soil temperature is likely due to changes in vegetation structure, as the bracken fern does not provide as much shade and temperature control as the native forest canopy. Thus, even in the absence of strong effects on air temperature, changes in the temporal and spatial variability of soil temperature may be observed, with possible consequences for plant recruitment and soil organisms.

Este artigo analisa a atividade fitotóxica de extratos aquosos de folhas jovens e maduras de Serjania lethalis A. St. -Hil. sobre a germinação e o crescimento de sementes de Panicum maximum Jacq. Foram preparados extratos aquosos nas concentrações de 2,5, 5,0, 7,5 e 10% a partir de folhas secas e água destilada. A porcentagem de germinação, velocidade de germinação e sincronia foram afetadas negativamente pelos dois extratos. Os extratos exibiram fitotoxicidade e reduziram o crescimento de plântulas, e esses efeitos são dependentes da concentração. As diferentes concentrações dos extratos provocaram mudanças significativas no processo de germinação e crescimento de plântulas de P. maximum, em alguns casos variando devido ao estágio de maturação foliar, porém, não diferindo entre si para maioria das variáveis analisadas.

The effect of the adjacent non-forested environment on the forest near the edge, edge influence (EI), is an important impact in fragmented landscapes and is believed to vary with factors such as forest structure and edge contrast. In order to improve our understanding of the factors governing the variability in EI, we studied microclimate and vegetation at cerrado edges surrounded by variable land uses in southeastern Brazil, a system with both forest and savanna fragments. We determined the significance, magnitude and distance of EI on microclimate, vegetation structure and grass biomass which we measured along five transects perpendicular to fourteen edges in forest or savanna next to different land uses. We introduce a quantitative measure of edge contrast that considers land uses at different distances from the same edge (e.g., a firebreak between a forest edge and a plantation) and verified whether edge contrast is correlated with EI in this system. Notwithstanding the large variation in EI among variables and study sites, there were some similarities in the patterns of EI between forest and savanna edges. Edge contrast was successfully quantified by our measure but was only correlated with EI on moisture and grass biomass. Our results point to the high variability in EI within a region. Our quantitative measure of edge contrast may be useful in explaining variability in EI. However, much unexplained variation remains in the highly fragmented cerrado system which is affected by EI in both forest and savanna fragments.

Due to the absence of light, cave environments are devoid of photosynthesizing organisms, and depend on the input of food from above ground. We compared the quantity of food available in the different zones of two caves in Serra da Canastra, MG. The amount of plant debris was highest in the entrance zone, intermediate in the twilight zone, and minimal in the dark zone. Guano was practically absent from the entrance zone, but did not present any clear pattern between the twilight and the dark zones. Therefore, plant debris seem to be more important in the entrance zone, and guano in deeper zones. We conclude with some methodological recommendations related to the quantification of food input and to statistical inference.