Not form a smooth profile like the water table or surface elevation. In some circumstances, the hardened brown layer was underlain by pure white sand, sometimes under the water table. It appears likely that the location of this deposition layer was associated to the water table, but what that relationship may well be is at present not clear. Discussion Moisture availability, governed largely by depth to water table, considerably impacts the PubMed ID:http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20142977 standing biomass and species richness of plants in longleaf pine-wiregrass ecosystems simply because water is as limiting or more limiting than nutrient availability (Kirkman et al. 2001, Ford et al. 2008). Specifically, wet-mesic internet sites help higher floristic diversity and aboveground biomass than drier, upland web sites (Kirkman et al. 2001, Ford et al. 2008). Ant abundance, having said that, appears to become highest in the internet sites near to the water table (lowermedium), but not the shallowest sites (Figures 3, 4). This suggests that ground-dwelling ant productivity is linked to total ecosystem productivity in these web pages, but most species are restricted by a water table close to for the surface. As a result, depth to water table is one of the main aspects accountable for distribution patterns in each ants and plants, together with the exception that ants are strongly constrained by the wettest web sites (where plants will not be). Of course, water infiltration from beneath would constrain dwelling and rearing offspring within a subterranean nest. Beyond this simple generality, a number of species-specific patterns emerged. Well more than half on the 27 far more abundant ant species had been substantially much more abundant inJournal of Insect Science | www.insectscience.orgJournal of Insect Science: Vol. 12 | Article 114 some parts of your transects than in other people. Several had been completely absent from either the highest or lowest places. The transects represented gradients of depth to groundwater, vegetation, shading, elevation, soil differences, litter and also other correlated functions. The patterns of ant distributions thus correlate using a quantity of functions, the majority of which correlate with one another. How can the causal aspect(s) from this cafeteria of possibilities be teased out To which function(s) of your habitat would be the ants responding, either by selections produced by colonyfounding queens, migration, or differential survival of colonies It seems doubtful that the species composition on the vegetation itself is critical. Gallberry vs. staggerbush may not matter. Far more likely, the vegetation creates a selection of microhabitats of temperature, moisture, and food resources (for LS519 manufacturer instance insect prey) that bring about the patterned abundance on the ant species. Furthermore, each the ants along with the vegetation are likely responding straight to the depth to the water table. The vegetation gradient represents plants that range from clearly wetland or wetland boundary plants, to those that tolerate rather xeric conditions or are intolerant of moist conditions (i.e., Opuntia sp.). A minimum of some ants, if not responding directly towards the plant cover, are likely responding directly towards the depth to groundwater for the reason that the nests they typically excavate would be truncated by the water table. Some sandhill ant species, such as S. geminata, D. bureni, and Prenolepis imparis, excavate nests which might be four m or extra deep (Tschinkel 1987; Tschinkel 2003; unpublished information). These species are totally absent in the flatwoods where the water table lurks never ever more than 2 m beneath ground. The Florida harvester ant, Pogonomyrmex badius, alth.