Colonization of experimentally arranged resource patches - a case study of fungivorous beetles
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.33338/ef.3836Abstract
The study focuses on a colonization experiment of beetles, using sporocarps of tinder fungus Fomes fomentarius. Initially, a mapping of all sporocarps of F. fomentarius and its inhabitants was made in a 225 ha area of boreal forest in southern Norway (control dataset). 62% of the sporocarps contained one or more beetle individuals. Experimental sporocarps were then placed out for three years, collected and dissected. 21% of these were colonized. The comparison between control and experiment showed that species assemblages were rather similar. Successful between-tree colonization and reproduction in experimental sporocarps by the darkling beetle Bolitophagus reticulatus was observed. Cis jacquemartii colonized 14% of the experimental sporocarps, and there was no effect of distance from known dispersal sources on colonization for this species. This indicates that C. jacquemartii was well able to locate and colonize new substrate within the scale covered in the study.
