Greenland glacier retreat: Resource pulses and their effects on predators, prey and plants
During the summer of 2015 and 2016 we have sampled live arthropod predators in dry pitfall traps and performed some prelaminary DNA gut content analysis on these arthropod predators from a glacier foreland area near Nuuk in West Greenland. Preliminary results from the analysis done in 2015 shows tha...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Conference Object |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2016
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://pure.au.dk/portal/da/publications/greenland-glacier-retreat-resource-pulses-and-their-effects-on-predators-prey-and-plants(66df7a3e-ba26-499d-a313-93798c0c9331).html https://pure.au.dk/ws/files/114709851/Gravesen_Dreyer_2016.pdf |
| Summary: | During the summer of 2015 and 2016 we have sampled live arthropod predators in dry pitfall traps and performed some prelaminary DNA gut content analysis on these arthropod predators from a glacier foreland area near Nuuk in West Greenland. Preliminary results from the analysis done in 2015 shows that Collembola was a common prey item, and spider consumption of Collembola increased in direct relationship to their abundance in each habitat type. Ground beetles consumed Collembola most often in gravel patches, while Collembola DNA was only detected in harvestmen from vegetated areas. Diptera (flies) were consumed by all three predators, but most often by ground beetles and nearly equally across all patch types. Curiously aphid DNA was only detected in beetles and harvestmen from bare ground patches where aphid abundance was very low and there were no vascular plants for them to feed on. The explanation for this could be that the predators had already eaten the aphids, while searching for them in vegetated plots. Our plan is to show the whole prey spectrum of the pioneer predators in this glacier foreland area. |
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