Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GSMNP), located in Tennessee and North Carolina, covers over 800 square miles and represents one of the largest tracts of uninterrupted forest in the eastern United States. The All-Taxa Biodiversity Inventory (ATBI) was begun in 1998 with the goal of cataloging all life within the Park. Nineteen research plots have been established to study arthropod diversity. The plots cover a wide range of habitats and elevations ranging from grassy fields at Cades Cove (457 m) to high-elevation spruce-fir forest at Clingmans Dome (1944 m). Each research location is equipped with two Malaise traps, ten pitfall traps, and two Lindgren funnel traps. Tipulomorpha (Cylindrotomiidae, Limoniidae, Ptychopteridae, Tipulidae, and Trichoceridae) is an important target taxon in this project. Crane fly diversity in GSMNP is being determined with bimonthly collections at eleven of the plot location for at least 25 months from October 2000 through September 2002. The objectives of this research are to: 1) complete a species list for GSMNP; 2) record and plot emergence patterns at each plot; 3) create species accumulation curves for each location; 4) define crane fly assemblages and estimated diversity at each site; 5) determine complementarity among sites; and 6) determine factors limiting crane fly species distributions. As of March 2001, 33 species have been identified, of which 19 are new records for GSMNP. The first winter sampling has resulted in three species of the wingless tipulid Chionea as well as five species of Trichocera, all of which are new records for GSMNP.
Keywords: Insect Diversity, Range of species
The ESA 2001 Annual Meeting - 2001: An Entomological Odyssey of ESA