Invertebrate Diversity and Conservation in the Western Ghats

The diversity and behavioural repertoire of invertebrates has always been inspiring for amateur naturalists and professional scientists. All over the world, this fascination for invertebrates have been encouraging studies on diverse invertebrates, helping us understand many fundamental biological processes, including ecology and evolution. Unfortunately, this is also the period of unprecedented loss of invertebrate diversity due to agrochemicals and deforestation. Globally, there is an increasing concern over the loss of invertebrate diversity. This loss of invertebrate populations across ecosystems has serious impact on ecosystem health and livelihood of dependent communities. Like many other tropical countries, very little is known about the diversity and distribution of invertebrates from India. This poor understanding of our invertebrate diversity is amply reflected in our national and regional conservation policies and goals, which is essentially formulated for large and charismatic vertebrates. The main objective of this book is to fill this gap. This edited volume provides an overview of ongoing studies on the diversity, ecology, evolution, behaviour and conservation of invertebrates of the Western Ghats (India).

The editors are Priyadarsanan D. R., Soubadra Devy M., Subramanian K.A., Aravind, N.A. and Seena N. K. The foreword for the book has been written by Michael Samways.

Contents

Foreword iii

Preface v

List of Contributors vii

Acknowledgements xi

SECTION I: Ecology and Conservation

Biogeographic origins and habitat use of the butterflies of the Western Ghats
Krushnamegh Kunte 1–21

Regional scale participatory monitoring of butterflies: A case study from the Western Ghats
K. A. Subramanian, K. Geetha Nayak, Madhav Gadgil, K. P. Achar, Acharya, K. N. Deviprasad,
K. Gopalakrishna Bhat, K. Murugan, Prakash R. Pandit, Shaju Thomas and Winfred Thomas 23–36

Community analysis of the butterflies of Anaikatty Hills, the Western Ghats, India
R. Eswaran and P. Pramod 37–50

Patterns of temporal variations observed in butterfly communities at puddle sites
Ravi Ramalingam 51–60

Ants of the Western Ghats: What we know and know not
Parthiba Basu 61–68

Mayflies (Ephemeroptera) of the Western Ghats: Biogeographic patterns and diversity profiles
K. G. Sivaramakrishnan and K. A. Subramanian 69–86

Mygalomorph spiders: Status review and conservation priorities in the Western Ghats
Manju Siliwal and Sanjay Molur 87–100

Population ecology and spatial distribution of gall mite Eriophyes sp. (Eriophyidae: Acari) on Canthium parviflorum (Rubiaceae)
Uma Ramachandran 101–110

Diversity, importance and conservation of pill millipedes (Sphaerotheriida, Diplopoda) of the Western Ghats
K. R. Sridhar 111–122

Ecology, diversity and distribution of centipedes (Scolopendromorpha: Chilopoda) in Northern Western Ghats
Jahnavi Joshi and Neelesh Dahanukar 123–132

Perturbation in the patterns of land snail diversity due to anthropogenic disturbance in wet evergreen forests of the Western Ghats
K. P. Rajashekhar and N. A. Aravind 133–144

Employing butterflies as ‘cultural keystone species’ – a window of opportunity towards enriching urban biodiversity in Bangalore
M. Soubadra Devy and Savitha Swamy 145–151

Ant diversity responses to changing land‐use forms in the central Western Ghats
Priyadarsanan Dharma Rajan and Aniruddha P. Marathe 153–162

SECTION II: Taxonomy and Diversity

Forest insect diversity of the Western Ghats: An appraisal with special reference to the Kerala part
George Mathew and R. S. M. Shamsudeen 163–173

The faunal diversity of chalcid wasps of the Western Ghats
T. C. Narendran and Mercy Ignatius 175–181

Platygastroidea (Hymenoptera) of the Western Ghats
K. Rajmohana 183–189

The true flies (Diptera) of the Western Ghats: knowledge status and richness estimates
Kumar Ghorpadé 191–218

Gerromorpha and Nepomorpha (Hemiptera) diversity in the Western Ghats
G. Thirumalai and S. Krishnan 219–223

Species diversity of whiteflies (Aleyrodidae: Hemiptera) in the Western Ghats
R. Sundararaj and A. K. Dubey 225–234

Diversity of spiders (Araneae) in the Western Ghats – an overview
P. A. Sebastian, A. V. Sudhikumar, M. J. Mathew and E. Sunish 235–247

Opiliones and opilioacarid diversity in the Western Ghats
N. P. I. Das 249–254

Freshwater copepods of Peninsular India
Shaju Thomas and Sasikala K. Joseph 255–265

Subject Index 267