Microhabitat heterogeneity in temperate forests: is distance to stems affecting ground-dwelling spider communities?

Ziesche, T. and Roth, M. (2013) Microhabitat heterogeneity in temperate forests: is distance to stems affecting ground-dwelling spider communities? Community Ecology, 14 (1). pp. 8-17. ISSN 1585-8553

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Abstract

Spiders contribute essentially to the arthropod community of forests and are known to be distributed in non-random pattern according to environmental, structural, competitive, and predacious conditions. The aim of the study was to investigate the effects of the distance to trees on the distribution pattern of soil-dwelling spiders. We verified the hypothesis that stem-close and stem-distant microhabitats differ with respect to taxonomical and ecological characteristics of spider assemblages, hence, functional significance on a small spatial scale. Ground-dwelling spiders were collected with pitfall traps in positions close (20–30 cm) and distant (2 m) to the stem bases in mature forests of different stand types (spruce, Douglas fir, beech-spruce, oak-beech). To identify significant drivers of spider assemblage composition, environmental parameters were assessed in relation with the arrangement of pitfall traps. The study documented significant variability in the composition of spider assemblages of stem-close and stem-distant pitfall traps within each of the study sites. The position of traps strongly affected species richness, species composition, activity density, and dominance structure. Thus, sampling at both positions revealed that the species richness of spiders is spatially restricted. Moreover, spider assemblage structure differed in the classification of species to size and ecological preference. Those results implicate potential consequences for their functional role in forests in relation to the distance to the trees.

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