Repeated survey along the foreland of a receding Norwegian glacier reveals shifts in succession of beetles and spiders ...

• Main Authors: Klopsch, Christian, Yde, Jacob C, Matthews, John A, Vater, Amber E, Gillespie, Mark AK
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: SAGE Journals 2022
• Subjects: Geography; History; glacier
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.25384/sage.c.6271706; https://sage.figshare.com/collections/Repeated_survey_along_the_foreland_of_a_receding_Norwegian_glacier_reveals_shifts_in_succession_of_beetles_and_spiders/6271706

Glacier forelands provide important sites to study climate-forced ecological succession because a chronosequence is apparent along a single valley. However, most studies of invertebrate succession in forelands provide a single snapshot of community assemblage patterns. With glaciers retreating rapidly worldwide, it is important to begin re-surveying community composition and assessing changes in relation to new terrain revealed by the retreating ice. In this study, we repeat a survey of spiders and beetles along the glacier foreland of the sub-alpine glacier Austerdalsbreen in western Norway, 15 years after an initial assessment in 2004, during which time the glacier has retreated 400 m. Invertebrates were sampled in 18 sites that represent a terrain age gradient of approximately 10–250 years since glacier recession. Forty spider species and 70 beetle species were identified, constituting the richest record in Nordic glacier forelands for these two taxonomic groups. Furthermore, three distinctive stages of ...