The spatiotemporal pattern of earthworm community in the grass savannas of Lamto (Ivory Coast)

Jean-Pierre Rossi (1) , Patrick Lavelle (2)

1 UMR CBGP - Centre de Biologie pour la Gestion des Populations
2 UPMC - Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6

The impact of earthworms on both soil physical properties and soil organic matter dynamics has been well documented (Lavelle and Spain 2001). There is a wealth of literature dedicated to the biological mechanisms at work or to empirical approaches based on field data. Assessing the functional role of a species or community implies establishing both time and space scales at which it is effectively the primary determinant of the process (es) at hand. In that context, space-time data analyses are powerful tools to process community data collected on numerous occasions but are, however, not widely disseminated in the community of ecologists. Although computer resources are available, one difficulty is that ad hoc field data are not always easily available which hinders the percolation of the methods.

Mots clés: Eudrilidae; Dichogaster agilis; Millsonia anomala; multivariate analysis; grass savanna; Earthworm community; space-time data; west Africa

Domaines: Biodiversité et Ecologie

Jean-Pierre Rossi, Patrick Lavelle. The spatiotemporal pattern of earthworm community in the grass savannas of Lamto (Ivory Coast): The spatiotemporal pattern of earthworm community in the grass savannas of Lamto (Ivory Coast). Biodiversity Data Journal, 2015, 3, pp.e6515. ⟨10.3897/BDJ.3.e6515⟩. ⟨hal-01274515⟩