Aim: Ants provide a range of ecosystem services but can also inflict serious socioeconomic and environmental impacts. Throughout this fellowship native and non-native ants will be studied at the protected Akrotiri Peninsula. Thus, increasing our knowledge on the biodiversity, spatiotemporal patterns and impacts of biological invasions through citizen-science and material surveys.
Objectives: 1. Provide a baseline of ants in the Akrotiri Peninsula to enhance scientific research around region’s the fauna. This will be achieved by conducting structured monthly surveys across man-made and natural habitats in Akrotiri Peninsula to assess the impacts of land-use and biological invasions on ant communities. In addition, the biodiversity and spatiotemporal patterns of native and non-native ants will be deciphered. 2. Raise public awareness, pool, supplement, and summarize our knowledge of the ant fauna of Cyprus by creating an online information portal about the “Ants of Cyprus”. 3. Establish and promote a citizen-science recording scheme “Antovreis” for the collection of ants by citizen-scientists. During the fellowship, the project will raise awareness on the ecological significance of ants, their role as household pests and biological invasions of non-native ants. Through this project, species richness, biological invasions and impacts of INNS as household pests will be investigated.
Duration: 1st July 2023 – 30th June 2025
Location: Cyprus, Western Sovereign Base Area of Akrotiri
Funded by: Darwin Plus
Coordinating partner: Enalia Physis Environmental Research Centre
For more information about this project and especially for ants of Cyprus, please press HERE
Direct partners: Enalia Physis Environmental Research Centre; Joint Services Health Unit Akrotiri SBA; UK Centre of Ecology and Hydrology; Department of Biodiversity and Evolutionary Taxonomy, University of Wrocław, Poland; Department of Zoology and Marine Biology, Faculty of Biology, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece (NKUA); Department Ecology and Systematics, Faculty of Biology, NKUA, Greece; and Biodiversity Laboratory, Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences, University of Cyprus. Publications: Salata S, Demetriou J, Georgiadis C, Borowiec L (2023) Camponotus Mayr, 1861 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) of Cyprus: generic synopsis and description of a new species. Asian Myrmecology 16: 016007. https://doi.org/10.20362/am.016007 Salata S, Demetriou J, Georgiadis C, Borowiec L (2023) The genus Messor Forel, 1890 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in Cyprus. Annales Zoologici 73(2): 215-234. http://dx.doi.org/10.3161/00034541ANZ2023.73.2.006 Salata S, Demetriou J, Georgiadis C, Borowiec L (2023) The ant genus Cataglyphis Förster (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in Cyprus. Zootaxa 5264(3): 301-322. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5264.3.1