Levantamento quali-quantitativo da fauna de solo em área de mata e pastagem em Benevides, Pará, com ênfase aos cupins (insecta, isoptera).

Abstract

The soil fauna is composed of a wide variety of taxa, ranging from microfauna to megafauna, highlighting in biomass some groups of insects, arachnids and earthworms, varying from one region to another. This study is being carried out in the municipality of Benevides with the objective of getting to know the soil mesofauna in general, qualitatively and quantitatively, at the level of large groups. Monthly collections were made using a cylindrical steel probe, 7 cm high by 7 in diameter. Thirty samples were taken per environment, sieved into Berlese-Tullgren funnels and exposed to a progressively graduated light source for no more than 72 h. The obtained material was collected in containers containing fixative and deposited in glasses containing 80 % alcohol, followed by sorting and counting of the colt groups. The initial results show the predominance of the following groups: mites (Arachinida: Acari), ants (Hyrnenoptera: Formicidac), collembola (Collembola), and other invcrtebrates such as coleoptera, homoptera and millipedes. This is in agreement with several studies that state the expressive abundance of ants, termites, mites and collembola among the soil fauna of diverse regions. However, the number of termites collected so far was small in relation to the number of ants and the number of mites. This result is certainly due to the mode of spatial distribution and foraging period of the various termite species.