Vast alluvial meadows fail to provide habitats to host ants of the butterfly Phengaris nausithous along upper Oder river
The result's identifiers
Result code in IS VaVaI
<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00098574%3A_____%2F25%3AN0000008" target="_blank" >RIV/00098574:_____/25:N0000008 - isvavai.cz</a>
Result on the web
<a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10841-026-00754-3" target="_blank" >https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10841-026-00754-3</a>
DOI - Digital Object Identifier
<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10841-026-00754-3" target="_blank" >10.1007/s10841-026-00754-3</a>
Alternative languages
Result language
angličtina
Original language name
Vast alluvial meadows fail to provide habitats to host ants of the butterfly Phengaris nausithous along upper Oder river
Original language description
Temperate mesic to damp grasslands were long viewed as seminatural habitats, established after forest clearance by humans and since then maintained by agricultural techniques. An issue unanswered under this view is the origin of diverse and specialised grassland biota, including European large blues of the genus Phengaris (Lycaenidae). These butterflies have been much studied owing to their myrmecophilous relationships with Myrmica ants, narrow habitat specificity, and threatened status. Phengaris nausithous, the most common Phengaris in Central Europe, inhabits damp to mesic meadows with representation of the initial larval host plant, Sanguisorba officinalis, and the ants Myrmica rubra (the most frequent host), M. scabrinodis and M. ruginodis. It displays close association with edges or small meadow patches, avoiding spacious uniformly managed units. Based on extensive ants trapping at the Oder river alluvial meadows, the Czech Republic, we demonstrate that the Myrmica host ants are absent from interiors of large and uniformly mown meadows, probably being outcompeted by numerically and ecologically dominant Lasius niger ant. The preferences of P. nausithous for edges is likely mediated by adult movement behaviour and had presumably evolved in mosaic landscapes with alternating wooded and grassland structures, arguably a common land cover in pre-Homo sapiens Europe.
Czech name
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Czech description
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Classification
Type
J<sub>imp</sub> - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database
CEP classification
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OECD FORD branch
10618 - Ecology
Result continuities
Project
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Continuities
V - Vyzkumna aktivita podporovana z jinych verejnych zdroju
Others
Publication year
2025
Confidentiality
S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů
Data specific for result type
Name of the periodical
Journal of Insect Conservation
ISSN
1366-638X
e-ISSN
1572-9753
Volume of the periodical
2026
Issue of the periodical within the volume
30
Country of publishing house
CH - SWITZERLAND
Number of pages
11
Pages from-to
19
UT code for WoS article
001697357800001
EID of the result in the Scopus database
2-s2.0-105030958319