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Invasion By Exotic Earthworms Alters Litter- And Soil-Dwelling Oribatid Mites, Jordan Burke, John Maerz, Joseph Milanovich, Melanie Fisk, Kamal Gandhi
Invasion By Exotic Earthworms Alters Litter- And Soil-Dwelling Oribatid Mites, Jordan Burke, John Maerz, Joseph Milanovich, Melanie Fisk, Kamal Gandhi
Joseph Milanovich
Exotic earthworms are drivers of biotic communities in invaded North American forest stands. Here we used ecologically important oribatid mite (Arachnida: Acari) communities, as model organisms to study the responses of litter- and soil-dwelling microarthropod communities to exotic earthworm invasion in a northern temperate forest. Litter- and soil-dwelling mites were sampled in 2008–2009 from forest areas: (1) with no earthworms; (2) those with epigeic and endogeic species, including Lumbricus rubellus Hoffmeister; and (3) those with epigeic, endogeic, and anecic earthworms including L. terrestris L. Species richness and diversity of litter- and soil-dwelling (0–2 cm soil depth) oribatid mites was 1–2 …