Date
2010
Abstract
Keystone species have large impacts on community and ecosystem properties, and create important ecological interactions with other species. Prairie dogs (Cynomys spp.) and banner-tailed kangaroo rats (Dipodomys spectabilis) are considered keystone species of grassland ecosystems, and create a mosaic of unique habitats on the landscape. These habitats are known to attract a number of animal species, but little is known about how they affect arthropod communities. Our research evaluated the keystone roles of prairie dogs and kangaroo rats on arthropods at the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge in central New Mexico, USA. We evaluated the impacts of these rodents on ground-dwelling arthropod and grasshopper communities in areas where prairie dogs and kangaroo rats co-occurred compared to areas where each rodent species occurred alone. Our results demonstrate that prairie dogs and kangaroo rats have keystone-level impacts on these arthropod communities. Their burrow systems provided important habitats for multiple trophic and taxonomic groups of arthropods, and increased overall arthropod abundance and species richness on the landscape. Many arthropods also were attracted to the aboveground habitats around the mounds and across the landscapes where the rodents occurred. Detritivores, predators, ants, grasshoppers, and rare rodent burrow inhabitants showed the strongest responses to prairie dog and kangaroo rat activity. The impacts of prairie dogs and kangaroo rats were unique, and the habitats they created supported different assemblages of arthropods. Where both rodent species occurred together on the landscape, there was greater habitat heterogeneity and increased arthropod diversity.
Handle
http://hdl.handle.net/1928/30023.1
Other Identifier
SEV198
Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity (KNB) Identifier
knb-lter-sev.198.123629
Document Type
Dataset
Rights
Data Policies: This dataset is released to the public and may be freely downloaded. Please keep the designated Contact person informed of any plans to use the dataset. Consultation or collaboration with the original investigators is strongly encouraged. Publications and data products that make use of the dataset must include proper acknowledgement of the Sevilleta LTER. Datasets must be cited as in the example provided. A copy of any publications using these data must be supplied to the Sevilleta LTER Information Manager. By downloading any data you implicitly acknowledge the LTER Data Policy (http://www.lternet.edu/data/netpolicy.html).
Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.6073/pasta/68087f42f36bb825942380a5eb82a98b
Temporal coverage
1999-10-01 - 2002-05-01
DOI
doi:10.6073/pasta/68087f42f36bb825942380a5eb82a98b
Permanent URL
http://dx.doi.org/10.6073/pasta/68087f42f36bb825942380a5eb82a98b
Recommended Citation
Davidson, Ana; Lightfoot, David (2010): Pino Gate Prairie Dog Study: Mound-scale Grasshopper Plot Data from the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge, New Mexico (2000-2001). Long Term Ecological Research Network. http://dx.doi.org/10.6073/pasta/68087f42f36bb825942380a5eb82a98b
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knb-lter-sev.198.123629-provenance.xml (4 kB)
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knb-lter-sev.198.123629-report.html (26 kB)
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sev198_pdoghoppermound_01142009.txt (88 kB)
Data in TXT format
Comments
This dataset was originally published on the Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) Network Data Portal, https://portal.lternet.edu, and potentially via other repositories or portals as described. The Digital Object Identifier (DOI) of the source data package is doi:10.6073/pasta/68087f42f36bb825942380a5eb82a98b, and may be accessed at http://dx.doi.org/10.6073/pasta/68087f42f36bb825942380a5eb82a98b. Metadata and files included in this record mirror as closely as possible the source data and documentation, with the provenance metadata and quality report generated by the LTER portal reproduced here as '*-provenance.xml' and *-report.html' files, respectively.