Natalia Kuznetsova

Collembolan community organization and its temporal predictability

Summary Long-term investigations on Collembola in Russian forests revealed that both stable and fluctuating communities can exist in natural ecosystems. Stable collembolan communities are characteristic of mesic moisture conditions, whilst fluctuating communities are typical of either xeric or hygric habitats. Stable communities are determined by between-year constancy in species and ecological structures, though other characteristics (for instance, total collembolan abundance or number of species) can vary. Stability of collembolan communities is externally stimulated by the constancy of environmental conditions or by their cyclic changing. Stable collembolan communities are best suited for the bioindication of long-term anthropogenic impacts on natural ecosystems, whereas fluctuating communities better reflect short-term environmental changes. A temporal predictability is possible only for stable communities.

Classification of collembolan communities in the east-european taiga

The data on collembolan communities from 46 forest sites belonging to 6 forest types of 11 regions of Russia, Lithuania, and Belarus were analysed. In coniferous spruce and pine forests (with lichen, cowberry, bilberry, moss and sphagnum ground cover) three types of collembolan communities were distinguishable: mesophilous, xeroresistant and hygrophilous. They are characterized not only by dominant and characteristic species, but by life forms, total collembolan abundance, species diversity and the level of variability of all these features. The types of Collembola communities are more easily recognised in forests of 40-100 years age than in younger forests. The suggested classification of collembolan communities is limited to areas of podzol soil; however, Collembola communities usually display these characteristics in coniferous forests grown outside of the taiga region, for example, in the mixed forest zone or in the forest-tundra.

Isotomidae of Japan and the Asiatic part of Russia. I. Folsomia ‘inoculata’ group

Abstract The paper considers blind species of the genus Folsomia having two pairs of macrosetae on both meso- and metathorax and united in so-called ‘inoculata’ group, which is given a new, more laconic definition. Morphological characters important in the group’s taxonomy are discussed and a further division into four subgroups is proposed. Eight new species, i.e., F. amurica Potapov & Kuznetsova, sp. n., F. breviseta Potapov & Kuznetsova, sp. n., F. calcarea Potapov, sp. n., F. imparis Potapov & Hasegawa, sp. n., F. laconica Potapov & Kuznetsova, sp. n., F. tertia Potapov, sp. n., F. trisensilla Potapov, sp. n., and F. tubulata Potapov & Babenko, sp. n., are described. F. hidakana Uchida & Tamura and F. inoculata Stach are redescribed basing on new material, for the latter species the Stach’s individuals were also examined. A key to species of the group is given.