Ground-dwelling beetle community in beech forests of Sado Island, Japan: comparison with the mainland

Island ecosystems differ from mainland ecosystems in their long-term isolation. On Sado Island, Japan, cattle grazing in the past gradually changed forests into grasslands, thereby altering the diversity of indigenous insects. We compared ground-dwelling beetle diversity on Sado Island to that on the nearby mainland. Contrary to previous reports, the island isolation effect resulted in lower γ and β diversity than on the mainland, because of the low species richness of beetles with low dispersal abilities. Few flightless beetles could invade Sado Island, even when the beech forests on the island were relatively adjacent to those on the mainland. Such a history of ecosystem formation could be the general pattern for continental-island mountain forests that were never connected to those of the mainland. We did not observe low α diversity of ground-dwelling beetles, suggesting that the cattle grazing history of the island has not changed environmental conditions for ground-dwelling beetles enough to reduce their diversity. In addition, cattle grazing increases the abundance of merdivorous insects by increasing the abundance of their food resource.