Canopy and Litter Ant Assemblages Share Similar Climate-Species Density Relations

Abstract

Tropical forest canopies house most of the globe’s diversity, yet little is known about global patterns and drivers of canopy diversity. Here we present models of ant species density, using climate, abundance and habitat (i.e., canopy v. litter) as predictors. Ant species density is positively associated with temperature and precipitation, and negatively (or non‐significantly) associated with two metrics of seasonality, precipitation seasonality and temperature range. Ant species density was significantly higher in canopy samples, but this difference disappeared once abundance was considered. Thus, the apparent differences in species density between canopy and litter samples are likely due to differences in abundance‐diversity relationships, not differences in climate‐diversity relationships. Thus it appears that canopy and litter ant assemblages share a common abundance‐diversity relationship influenced by similar but not identical climatic drivers.