The Nature of the Taxon Cycle in the Melanesian Ant Fauna

作者：Edward O. Wilson · 发表于：The American Naturalist · 年份：1961 · DOI：10.1086/282174 · 被引用次数：684 · 研究领域：Insect and Arachnid Ecology and Behavior、Plant and animal studies、Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies

Undisturbed ant faunas of islands in the Moluccas-Melanesian arc are for the most part "saturated," that is, approach a size that is correlated closely with the landmass of the island but only weakly with its geographic location (figure 1). In the Ponerinae and Cerapachyinae combined the saturation level can be expressed approximately as F=3A0.6, where F is the number of species in the fauna and A the area of the island in square miles. Interspecific competition, involving some degree of colonial warfare, plays a major role in the determination of the saturation curve. It deploys the distribution of some ant species into mosaic patterns and increases the diversification of local faunas. Perhaps because of the complex nature of the Melanesian fauna, differences between local faunas appear that give the subjective impression of randomness. Despite the action of species exclusion, the size of local faunas occurring within a set sample area increases with the total size of the island (figure 2). Water gaps break populations and initiate speciation in Melanesia. Endemic insular faunas build up primarily by the process of multiple invasion. Expanding species now on Melanesia originated almost exclusively from tropical Asia, New Guinea, and Australia. Faunal dominance, measured by the degree of faunal interpenetration, is a direct function of land area and is less directly related to insular faunal size (figure 4). Taxa originating in Melanesia exclusive of New Guinea are almost all...