Ant Species Diversity in the Bogor Botanic Garden, West Java, Indonesia, with Descriptions of Two New Species of the Genus Leptanilla (Hymenoptera, Formicidae)

Abstract

Ant fauna was investigated in the Bogor Botanic Garden (Kebun Raya Bogor), West Java, Indonesia, by the following sampling methods: (1) collection of ants on tree trunks, (2) collection of litter ants using a handy sifter, (3) pitfall traps, (4) sugar baits, (5) collection of ants on bamboo shoots, (6) searching for colonies, (7) collection of foraging workers. In all, 216 species representing all the subfamilies known from the Oriental region were collected in 1985 and between 1990 and 1998. After intensive collections in 1995 and 1997, the cumulative number of ant species was still increasing slowly in 1998. The ant fauna was compared with the results from other sites in Southeast Asia, and those of preliminary surveys made by us in four national parks in West Java, i.e., Ujung Kulon and Pangandaran (lowland forests), and Gunung Halimun and Gunung Gede (mountain forests). Species composition in the Bogor Botanic Garden was similar to that of lowland rainforests in West Java, but remarkably different from mountain forests.