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Responses of leaf-litter ant communities to tropical forest wildfires vary with season

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 August 2012

Juliana M. Silveira*
Affiliation:
Universidade Federal de Lavras – UFLA, Caixa Postal 3037, Cep: 37200-000, Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brasil
Jos Barlow
Affiliation:
Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YQ, UK
Rafael B. Andrade
Affiliation:
South Dakota State University, Brookings-SD 57007, USA
Luiz A. M. Mestre
Affiliation:
South Dakota State University, Brookings-SD 57007, USA Universidade Federal do Paraná, Palotina-PR 85950-000, Brazil
Sébastien Lacau
Affiliation:
Universidade Estadual do Sudoeste da Bahia, Itapetinga-BA, 45700-000, Brazil
Mark A. Cochrane
Affiliation:
South Dakota State University, Brookings-SD 57007, USA
*
1Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

Extract

Fire is an important land-management tool in tropical forest landscapes. However, these fires sometimes escape into surrounding forests (Uhl & Buschbacker 1985), and are one of the most severe disturbances threatening tropical forest biodiversity (Barlow et al 2006). These forest fires have become more frequent over the last decades due to the combined effect of selective logging, fragmentation and abnormal droughts that increase the flammability of forests, and agriculture expansion that brings the ignition sources (Aragão & Shimabukuro 2010).

Type
Short Communication
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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