Diversity of ground beetles (Coleoptera, Carabidae): does forest management matter?

Abstract

Forest management is suspected to negatively impact biodiversity, but this impact variesgreatly between taxonomic groups. Although ground beetles are often used to assess theimpact of habitat changes, few studies have compared carabid communities between managedand unmanaged forest stands. In this study we compared the diversity of carabids in terms oftotal species richness and species richness of several ecological groups (trophic groups,canopy-openess affinities, dispersal ability and moisture affinities) within six French forestsites comprising managed and unmanaged areas. We set up 269 pitfall traps distributed across92 plots. We analysed the effects of management type, stand basal area andmicroenvironmental variables on carabid diversity. We found that management did notinfluence carabid total and partial species richness. Yet, diversity was influenced by,depending on the ecological group, stand basal area, humus form, sapling density, seedlingcover and abiotic parameters (pH, elevation). Our results suppose that maintenance oflandscape heterogeneity is necessary to promote overall ground beetle diversity. Moreover weshown that forest specialist species diversity is positively dependant on stand basal area,special attention should be paid to conserve adult stands in the landscape for the preservationof this specific diversity