Abstract: The response of tropical fauna to landscape-level habitat change is poorly understood. Increased conversion
of native primary forest to alternative land-uses, including secondary forest and exotic tree plantations, highlights
the importance of assessing diversity patterns within these forest types. We sampled 1848 moths from 335 species of
Arctiidae, Saturniidae and Sphingidae, over a total of 30 trap-nights. Sampling was conducted during the wet season
2005, using three light-traps at 15 sites within areas of primary forest, secondary forest and Eucalyptus urograndis
plantations in northern Brazilian Amazonia. The Jari study region provides one of the best opportunities to investigate
the ecological consequences of land-use change, and this study is one of the first to examine patterns of diversity for a
neotropical moth assemblage in a human-dominated landscape in lowland Amazonia. We found that the three moth
families responded consistently to disturbance in terms of abundance and community structure but variably in terms
of species richness, in a manner apparently supporting a life-history hypothesis. Our results suggest that secondary
forests and Eucalyptus plantations can support a substantial level ofmoth diversity but also show that these forest types
hold assemblages with significantly distinct community structures and composition from primary forest. In addition,
the ability of these converted land-uses to support primary forest species may be enhanced by proximity to surrounding
primary forest, an issue which requires consideration when assessing the diversity and composition of mobile taxa in
human-dominated landscapes.
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