Articles by Pekka Punttila

The colonisation of a burned clear-cut by ants in southern Finland was monitored using pitfall traps, artificial nest sites, and direct nest sampling from the ground and stumps. Clearcutting and fire seemed to have destroyed wood-ant colonies (Formica rufa group), and also other mature-forest species suffered from fire. Myrmica ruginodis Nylander was able to survive only in less severely burned moist sites, whereas it benefitted from the enhanced light conditions in a non-burned clear-cut. The fire resulted in an essentially ant-free terrain into which pioneering species immigrated. The mortality of nest-founding queens appeared to be high. The results supported the hypothesis that the pioneering species tend to be those that are capable of independent colony founding, followed by species founding nests through temporary nest parasitism. The succession of the burned clear-cut differed from that of the non-burned one, suggesting that habitat selection in immigration and priority effects, i.e. competition, introduce deterministic components in the successional pathways of boreal ant communities.

• Punttila, E-mail: pp@mm.unknown
• Haila, E-mail: yh@mm.unknown

Habitat loss and degradation are the main threats to biodiversity worldwide. For example, nearly 80% of peatlands in southern Finland have been drained. There is thus a need to safeguard the remaining pristine mires and to restore degraded ones. Ants play a pivotal role in many ecosystems and like many keystone plant species, shape ecosystem conditions for other biota. The effects of mire restoration and subsequent vegetation succession on ants, however, are poorly understood. We inventoried tree stands, vegetation, water-table level, and ants (with pitfall traps) in nine mires in southern Finland to explore differences in habitats, vegetation and ant assemblages among pristine, drained (30–40 years ago) and recently restored (1–3 years ago) pine mires. We expected that restoring the water-table level by ditch filling and reconstructing sparse tree stands by cuttings will recover mire vegetation and ants. We found predictable responses in habitat structure, floristic composition and ant assemblage structure both to drainage and restoration. However, for mire-specialist ants the results were variable and longer-term monitoring is needed to confirm the success of restoration since these social insects establish perennial colonies with long colony cycles. We conclude that restoring the water-table level and tree stand structure seem to recover the characteristic vegetation and ant assemblages in the short term. This recovery was likely enhanced because drained mires still had both acrotelm and catotelm, and connectedness was still reasonable for mire organisms to recolonize the restored mires either from local refugia or from populations of nearby mires.

• Punttila, Finnish Environment Institute, P.O. Box 140, FI-00251 Helsinki, Finland E-mail: pekka.punttila@ymparisto.fi
• Autio, Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment in South Ostrobothnia, P.O. Box 252, FI-65101 Vaasa, Finland E-mail: olli.autio@ely-keskus.fi
• Kotiaho, University of Jyväskylä, Department of Biology & Environmental Sciences, P.O. Box 35, FI-40014 Jyväskylä, Finland E-mail: janne.kotiaho@jyu.fi
• Kotze, University of Helsinki, Department of Environmental Sciences, P.O. Box 65, FI-00014, University of Helsinki, Finland E-mail: johan.kotze@helsinki.fi
• Loukola, University of Oulu, Department of Biology, P.O. Box 3000, FI-90014 Oulu, Finland E-mail: olli.loukola@gmail.com
• Noreika, University of Helsinki, Department of Environmental Sciences, P.O. Box 65, FI-00014, University of Helsinki, Finland; University of Helsinki, Department of Biosciences, P.O. Box 65, FI-00014 University of Helsinki, Finland E-mail: norbertas.noreika@gmail.com
• Vuori, University of Jyväskylä, Department of Biology & Environmental Sciences, P.O. Box 35, FI-40014 Jyväskylä, Finland E-mail: anna@kureniemi.fi
• Vepsäläinen, University of Helsinki, Department of Biosciences, P.O. Box 65, FI-00014 University of Helsinki, Finland E-mail: kari.vepsalainen@helsinki.fi