Terry McGlynn

California State University, Dominguez Hills | CSUDH · Department of Biology

Species–energy theory can account for spatial variation in the abundance and community composition of animals, though the mechanisms of species–energy theory are under contention. We evaluated three competing mechanisms at the local spatial scale by conducting an in vivo light manipulation over supplemental ant nests placed in the leaf litter of a...

The decomposition of leaf litter is governed, in part, by litter invertebrates. In tropical rain forests, ants are dominant predators in the leaf litter and may alter litter decomposition through the action of a top-down control of food web structure. The role of ants in litter decomposition was investigated in a Costa Rican lowland rain forest wit...

In tropical climates, nest movements by mature ant colonies are probably widespread but the phenomenon of nest relocation is poorly described (McGlynn 2007, McGlynn et al . 2004, Smallwood 1982a). For species that nest in soil, the costs and risks associated with excavating and establishing new nests are consequential, and it is assumed that reloca...

Serial monodomy is the nesting behavior in which a colony of animals maintains multiple nests for its exclusive use, occupying one nest at a time. Among serially monodomous ants, the availability of unoccupied nests reduces the probability and costs of army ant attacks. It has been proposed that nest odors mediate serial monodomy in the gypsy ant,...

A positive relationship between species richness and productivity is often observed in nature, but the causes remain contentious. One mechanism, the 'more individuals hypothesis' (MIH), predicts richness increases monotonically with density, as a function of resource flux. To test the MIH, we manipulated resource abundance in a community of tropica...

1. Insects spend energy to function in high temperature environments, and because social insects employ a division of labor, it is likely that thermal tolerance varies among individuals in the colony, based on the tasks that they perform. 2. Foraging workers of the ant Neotropical ant Ectatomma ruidum are known to show temporal differences in therm...

Local community structure is shaped by processes acting at local and landscape scales. The relative importance of drivers operating across different spatial scales are difficult to test without observations across regional or latitudinal gradients. Cities exhibit strong but predictable environmental gradients overlaying a mosaic of highly variable...

The urban heat island effect is a worldwide phenomenon that has been linked to species distributions and abundances in cities. However, effects of urban heat on biotic communities are nearly impossible to disentangle from effects of land cover in most cases because hotter urban sites also have less vegetation and more impervious surfaces than coole...

The urban heat island effect is a worldwide phenomenon that has been linked to species distributions and abundances in cities. However, effects of urban heat on biotic communities are nearly impossible to disentangle from effects of land cover in most cases because hotter urban sites also have less vegetation and more impervious surfaces than coole...

Human societies depend on an Earth system that operates within a constrained range of nutrient availability, yet the recent trajectory of terrestrial nitrogen (N) availability is uncertain. Examining patterns of foliar N concentrations and isotope ratios (δ15N) from more than 43,000 samples acquired over 37 years, here we show that foliar N concent...

The popularity of science blogging has increased in recent years, but the number of academic scientists who maintain regular blogs is limited. The role and impact of science communication blogs aimed at general audiences is often discussed, but the value of science community blogs aimed at the academic community has largely been overlooked. Here, w...

In the tropics, daily temperature fluctuations can pose physiological challenges for ectothermic organisms, and upper thermal limits may affect foraging activity over the course of the day. Variation in upper thermal limits can occur among and within species, and for social insects such as ants, within colonies. Within colonies, upper thermal limit...

The entomological community recognizes the imperative for diversifying our profession, by promoting an agenda to broaden participation of junior scientists who are members of groups underrepresented in our discipline. Progress has been inadequate. I describe approaches to professional development and recruitment of students from Minority-Serving In...

We describe an emigration of the Neotropical army ant Eciton mexicanum where the head of the emigration column was separated in time from previous raid column activity, and the emigration was not connected to the new bivouac site by a column of workers. Over 12 h elapsed between raid activity and the onset of emigration, suggesting the emigration f...

What forces structure ecological assemblages? A key limitation to general insights about assemblage structure is the availability of data that are collected at a small spatial grain (local assemblages) and a large spatial extent (global coverage). Here, we present published and unpublished data from 51,388 ant abundance and occurrence records of mo...

1.Canopy-foragingantshavecarbohydrate-richdietsandthestoichiometric excess of carbon may result in energetic allocation decisions that facilitate ecological dominance. 2. If dietary carbohydrates facilitate ecological dominance in canopy ants, then the mechanism for this relationship is unknown. 3. Four hypotheses were posit that may explain how a...

Overbrowsing has created depauperate plant communities throughout the eastern deciduous forest. We hypothesized these low-diversity plant communities are associated with lower insect diversity. We compared insects inside and outside a 60-year-old fenced deer exclosure where plant species richness is 5x higher inside versus outside. We sampled above...

A principal benefit of social living is the communal defence of resources. However, in the ant Ectatomma ruidum, specialized thieves often circumvent detection by conspecific non-nestmates, and those detected are peacefully expelled. Colonies can gather food through typical foraging (opportunistically tracking prey or nutrients in the home range) o...

Most social animals have mechanisms to distinguish group members from outsiders, in part to prevent the exploitation of resources reserved for members of the group. Nevertheless, specialized thieves of the Neotropical ant, Ectatomma ruidum, also known as the 'thieving ant', regularly enter and steal resources from distinct, neighboring colonies. He...

Background/Question/Methods The spatial complexity of light as it passes through the rainforest canopy facilitates the coexistence of species in the understory. Here we posit that the spatial heterogeneity of light that passes through to the leaf litter layer has similar effect on the biodiversity of the animals that inhabit the leaf litter. The s...

We document a facultative Bartonella-like Rhizobiales bacterium in the giant tropical ant, Paraponera clavata. In a lowland tropical rainforest in Costa Rica, 59 colonies were assayed for the prevalence of the Bartonella-like bacterium (BLB), 14 of which were positive. We addressed three questions: First, how does the prevalence of BLB within colon...

Flexibility in behavior can increase the likelihood that a forager may respond optimally in a fluctuating environment. Nevertheless, physiological or neuronal constraints may result in suboptimal responses to stimuli. We observed foraging workers of the giant tropical ant (also referred to as the "bullet ant"), Paraponera clavata, as they reacted t...

Animals modify their foraging strategies in response to environmental changes that affect foraging performance. In some species, cleptobiosis represents an alternative strategy for resource access. The environmental factors that favor the incidence or prevalence of cleptobiosis, however, are poorly described. The cleptobiotic Neotropical ant Ectato...

The efficient investment of resources is often the route to ecological success, and the adaptability of resource investment may play a critical role in promoting biodiversity. The ants of the "hyperdiverse" genus Pheidole produce two discrete sterile castes, soldiers and minor workers. Within Pheidole, there is tremendous interspecific variation in...

Proportional investment in soldiers of Pheidole from the current study and previously published reports. (PDF)

Background/Question/Methods As dead plant material accumulates on the floor of tropical forests, a bevy of creatures are sustained by this substrate as it is broken apart by the environment and its inhabitants. The structure of the detrital food web - from microbe to microfauna to mesofauna to macroscopic eukaryotes – is steadily becoming elucida...

In this study, we investigated whether landscape-scale variation of soil P accounts for 13 C and 15 N composition of detrital invertebrates in a lowland tropical rain forest in Costa Rica. The top 10-cm soil, leaf-litter samples and plant foliage were collected among 18 plots representing a threefold soil P gradient during 2007–2009. Body tissue of...

Colonies of ants of the genus Pheidole produce two discrete sterile worker castes, soldiers and minor workers. Naturally occurring colonies of Pheidole demonstrate great heterogeneity in the relative production of soldiers and minors. Some species have demonstrated the ability to adjust caste ratios in response to environmental conditions, but litt...

In a Costa Rican population of the bullet ant, Paraponera clavata, there is heterogeneity in the presence of Rhizobiales bacteria. Here we examine ecological and dietary factors that may affect the presence of Bartonella within a colony. Environmental conditions of the nesting sites and dietary preferences of colonies were evaluated, and diet manip...

Aim To use a fine-grained global model of ant diversity to identify the limits of our knowledge of diversity in the context of climate change. Location Global. Methods We applied generalized linear modelling to a global database of local ant assemblages to predict the species density of ants globally. Predictors evaluated included simple climate va...

Social insect colonies are typically mobile entities, moving nests from one location to another throughout the life of a colony. The majority of social insect species-ants, bees, wasps, and termites-have likely adopted the habit of relocating nests periodically. The syndromes of nest relocation include legionary nomadism, unstable nesting, intrinsi...

Light may limit or constrain the activity of litter-dwelling arthropods in tropical forests. Canopies permit very little light to penetrate to the ground, and small sunflecks may be important to the denizens of leaf litter who may become active - or inactivated - by the penetration of light. We conducted a manipulative experiment by experimentally...

Biological invasions are generally thought to occur after human aided migration to a new range. However, human activities prior to migration may also play a role. We studied here the evolutionary genetics of introduced populations of the invasive ant Wasmannia auropunctata at a worldwide scale. Using microsatellite markers, we reconstructed the mai...

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 versus litter) as predictors. Ant species density is positively associated with temperature and precipitation, and...

Predicting which species will invade and which areas will be invaded are primary goals of the study of biological invasions. Moving beyond the single species approach and investigating patterns of ant species movement into new areas, biogeographic patterns of invasion, and systematic perspectives on the evolutionary correlates of success will bring...

The isotopic composition of generalist consumers may be expected to vary in space as a consequence of spatial heterogeneity in isotope ratios, the abundance of resources, and competition. We aim to account for the spatial variation in the carbon and nitrogen isotopic composition of a generalized predatory species across a 500 ha. tropical rain fore...

Background/Question/Methods In tropical rain forests, the density of arthropods in the detrital food web is predicted by the biomass of detritus and the abundance of limiting nutrients, usually P. The trophic structure of this food web is likely to respond to spatial differences in biomass and nutrient inputs, and here we test competing models tha...

Although many taxa show a latitudinal gradient in richness, the relationship between latitude and species richness is often asymmetrical between the northern and southern hemispheres. Here we examine the latitudinal pattern of species richness across 1003 local ant assemblages. We find latitudinal asymmetry, with southern hemisphere sites being mor...

The nutritional demands of animals vary by taxon. Across landscapes, communities of animals experience variability in the stoichiometry of carbon and nutrients within their resource base. Thus, we expect stoichiometry to contribute to the spatial variance in the demographic parameters of animal communities. Here, we measure how the composition of a...

Colonies of ants often house multiple queens, and variation in polygyny often tracks environmental conditions. Three hypotheses have been proposed to describe how environmental variation may account for the degree of polygyny: competition, food limitation and nest limitation. Here I evaluate these hypotheses with studies on litter-nesting thief ant...

Natural history is more than just an historic root of contemporary biology. Organisms are the heart of biology education and research, and to prepare students as holistic thinkers we must show them how to see the organism for the cells as well as the forest for the trees. In each institutional setting, some avenues are easier and more practical tha...

Abstract 1. The term serial monodomy is used to describe a life-history phenomenon in social insects. Serially monodomous colonies maintain multiple nests for their exclusive use, but only occupy one nest at a time. 2. The hypothesis that colony odours mediate nest relocation decisions was tested in the serially monodomous species Aphaenogaster ara...

Despite several centuries of research, the global patterns of species diversity, individual abundance and community composition and their drivers and subtleties remain poorly resolved. We have developed a global database for the di-versity of ants, perhaps the best-studied of ecologically important insect taxa. We describe the database and aspects...

The stoichiometry of resources may explain bottom-up regulation of higher trophic levels. We tested the effects of soil and litter nutrient stoichiometry on the invertebrate litter fauna of a Costa Rican tropical rain forest. Animal densities were estimated from 15 sites across a phosphorus gradient. The density of the invertebrate litter fauna var...

The leaf litter of tropical wet forests is replete with itinerant ant nests. Nest movement may help ants evade the constraints of stress and disturbance and increase access to resources. I studied how nest relocation and environmental factors may explain the density, size, and growth of leaf litter ant nests. I decoupled the relationships among lit...

Sessile and vagile organisms differ from one another in some fundamental ways, including methods of resource acquisition and competition. Ant colonies are typically studied as sessile entities, even though a large fraction of ant species frequently relocate their nests in the course of their life history. Little is known about the causes and conseq...

We studied how the tropical wet forest ant Aphaenogaster araneoides adjusted its home range and foraging behavior in response to changes in the leaf litter and food environments. We decoupled litter abundance and food availability by creating a factorial treatment design including litter removal and food supplementation. Leaf litter removal caused...

How do animals respond to an unpredictably heterogeneous environ-ment? Ants foraging in the leaf litter of tropical wet forests experience unpredict-ably fluctuating food resources. To study how an ant species responds to these changes, foragers were tracked to determine home ranges of 51 colonies of Aphaen-ogaster araneoides, in three sites in a C...

Caste ratio theory predicts that polymorphic ant colonies should be able to alter the ratio of worker sizes in response to changing environmental demands. We selected a common dimorphic species, Pheidole flavens, for a field manipulation to test whether caste allocation will change in response to food supplementation. We collected, without replacem...

Lanchester's laws are mathematical models, originally designed to model military combat, that describe battle outcomes based on the sizes of armies and the potencies of individual fighting units. The ''square law'' describes a scenario in which small-sized competitors may use a numerical advantage to overcome large-sized competitors in simultaneous...

In Neotropical wet forests several species of omnivorous, resource-defending ants, live and forage in close proximity to one another. Although the forest floor is heterogeneous in microhabitat and food quantity, little is known about the impact of microhabitat and food variation upon resource monopoly among ants. We investigated how food type and m...

I compare the sizes of non-native and native ants to evaluate how worker size may be related to the ability of a species to invade new habitats. I compare the size of 78 non-native ant species belonging to 26 genera with the size of native congeneric species; native ants are larger than non-native ants in 22 of 26 genera. Ants were sorted by genera...

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Our findings give new insight into the relationship between nestmate recognition and cleptobiosis, intraspecific thievery of newly collected food items, in a neotropical ponerine ant, Ectatomma ruidum. The expression of discrimination of nestmates from non-nestmates varied among local aggregations of E. ruidum in a population at Barro Colorado Isla...

The goal of this study was to assess territoriality and foraging home ranges for stingless bee species; and to develop methods for censusing stingless bee colonies. Colonies of two meliponine bee species, Trigonacorvina Cockerell and Trigonaamalthea Vachal, were censused using carrion and honey baits. Trigonacorvina and Trigonaamalthea are disperse...

AimThis is the first comprehensive account of the biogeography of ants transferred and at least temporarily established outside their native habitat. LocationUsing museum and literature records, I established the distributions of transferred ant species. MethodsI used taxonomic and functional groups to assess how geographical spread as a transferre...

The ecology of New World onychophorans is poorly known because individuals are rare and difficult to locate in the field. The only descriptions of density and microhabitat associations are based on the field observations of a few individuals. This paper presents the results of a 300-m2 search of leaf litter in a wet tropical forest at La Selva Biol...