DOI: 10.5061/dryad.1g1jwsv00
title: Termite diversity is resilient to land-use change

description: Cocoa is an important crop for Ghana’s economy, contributing 25% of Gross
 Domestic Product (GDP). The crop, however, is mainly cultivated on
 forest-derived soils and is a major cause of land-use change. Termites are
 an important biological component of tropical ecosystems providing
 numerous ecosystem services. Previous studies have indicated that termites
 are sensitive to forest disturbance and decrease in richness and abundance
 across land-use intensification gradients, with consequences for the
 essential services that they provide. Native shade trees are often used to
 improve cocoa cultivation and may reduce the detrimental effects of
 land-use change on some aspects of biodiversity. The aim of this study was
 therefore to explore how termites respond to land-use change along a
 shade-tree gradient in Kakum National Park and surrounding cocoa farms in
 Ghana (from forest at 80% tree cover to cocoa with no shade cover, to the
 extreme of cultivated arable crop land). It was predicted that termite
 richness and abundance would decrease with decreasing shade cover, and
 with increasing distance from the forest edge. Thirty-four species from 29
 genera were sampled, with Ancistrotermes crucifer being found in all the
 locations (47% of all encounters). Species richness and abundance differed
 marginally across the land-use gradient, as well as the distance from the
 forest edge, however, species richness did not show any significance with
 distance. All the same, termite communities were robust to the
 disturbance. Our findings suggest that though site influenced species
 richness and abundance, cocoa trees can play a crucial role in maintaining
 biodiversity and environmental quality in an agricultural landscape by
 providing a habitat for forest species that are not found in pastures or
 farm fields. However, we caution that the relatively low forest baseline
 of existing forest diversity may inflate the value of cocoa land, with
 those forests no longer representing undisturbed natural habitats: this
 highlights that shifting baselines may need to be accounted for when
 interpreting findings in the Anthropocene.
description: Termites were sampled along a single belt transect at each site
 using the standardized transect method as described by Jones and Eggleton
 (2000). Transects were 100 m long and 2 m wide, divided into 20 sections
 of 5 x 2 m each. Transects were geo-referenced, with GPS coordinates taken
 at the beginning and the end of each transect. One person-hour of sampling
 effort per section was used to search for and collect termites from the
 soil (12 pits of approximately 12 cm x 12 cm x 10 cm (depth) were dug per
 section), accumulations of litter and humus at the base of trees, the
 inside of dead wood, tree stumps, soil within and beneath very rotten
 logs, subterranean nests, mounds, runways on vegetation and arboreal nests
 up to a height of 2 m above ground level. Termites were searched for
 within each transect section, and samples were collected for each
 encounter and placed in separate vials. When possible, termite samples for
 each encounter consisted of two to three soldiers and five to seven
 workers: in total, seven to ten individuals. Termites were placed in vials
 filled with 70 @ ethanol and labelled according to the section of the
 transect they were collected.
description: N/A