Abstract

QUIJANO C., Luis  and  MARTINEZ H., Neis. TEMPORARY VARIATION OF ARACHNOFAUNA (ARACHNIDA: ARANEAE) IN A FRAGMENT OF DRY TROPICAL FOREST (DTF) IN THE DEPARTMENT OF ATLÁNTICO, COLOMBIA. Bol. Cient. Mus. Hist. Nat. Univ. Caldas [online]. 2015, vol.19, n.2, pp.381-396. ISSN 0123-3068.  https://doi.org/10.17151/bccm.2015.19.2.24.

The temporary variation of the composition and structure of arachnofauna in the Reserva Campesina La Montaña (RCM), department of Atlántico, Colombia was analyzed. Ten samples were taken between November 2012 and August 2013 in order to cover the dry and rainy seasons. A 500 m long, 20 m wide linear transect was delimited, where 10 sampling points spaced 50 m from each other were marked. In each sampling point, spiders were collected using manual capture methods (MC), agitation foliage (AF), litter sifting (LS) and pitfall trap (PT). A total of 1,866 individuals distributed in 32 families were captured. The family Araneidae was the most abundant with 525 individuals (28.1%), followed by Salticidae and Lycosidae with 407 (21.8%) and 173 individuals (9.27%) respectively. The first family showed its greater abundance in May (108), while Salticidae showed the highest value in January (69) and Lycosidae in February with 33 individuals. With regard to the family richness, the highest values occurred in June (25) and December with 22 families recorded. Additionally eight guilds were observed from which the most abundant (567 individuals) were the orb weaving (OW) constructors, with the highest value in May while cursorial soil spiders (CS) were the most diverse (10 families), being January, February and June the months with the greatest number of families (8). These results demonstrate that the spider communities in the area present a temporal pattern that depends on seasonal changes that occur in the Dry Tropical Forest.

Keywords : temporal variation; season; Araneidae; Salticidae; guilds; orb weaving constrctors.

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