Comparing baited versus non-baited subterranean insect traps for sampling forensically important soil fauna in an urbangraveyard duringearly autumn

Graveyards have been shown to promote biodiversity,but localdata islacking in many regions. Arthropod taxa found in contemporaneous graves often reflects thesub-fossilinsect assemblages recovered from archaeological mortuary contexts. An exploratory project using subterranean insect traps compared the fauna collected with (bovine blood) baited traps versus non-baited traps. The urban graveyard the Mt. Moriah Cemetery in Philadelphia, PA, USA wasused for its association with an early American funerary archaeology site. Trapping occurred during U.S. calendar weeks 36 –45 in 2019.Theaverage daily air temperature during this period was 18.5 °C. Non-baited traps caught 52 individual insects while baited traps caught a total number of 92 individuals. Calculated biodiversity indices including all individuals were both higher for non-baited traps (SDI = 0.246; H = 2.81),but a T-Test showed no statistical difference between treatments. Baited traps had higher abundances of forensically important species. Taxa in baited traps included rove beetles in the genus Anotylus(Staphylinidae),four species of ants (Formicidae),and phorids (Phoridae). This project 1) supports further investigation of using baited traps to collect forensically important subterranean insects, 2) begins to address the gap in knowledge of insect biodiversity in Northeastern, USA graveyards, and 3) demonstrates possibilities for obtaining modern comparison specimens for funerary archaeoentomology investigations.