Ecology of temperate canopy arachnids

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Forests are precious to Canadians, and preserving their biodiversity is a key global priority. To do this we must first document the species living in our forests, from the ground to the canopy. Only then can we understand the ecological process and ecosystem services provided by forests. My research focuses on the ecology of forest canopy arachnids (spiders and mites), and the overall goal of my program is to understand the mechanisms behind arachnid diversity in the treetops of beech-maple forests in SW Quebec. I will start by documenting patterns of diversity and see how these patterns are related to spatial scale, and to test if there are unique species found in treetops. This will help to assess the way in which the arachnids from one forest may be connected to those from of a different forest. I will also focus efforts on understanding how dispersal links communities of spiders and mites and measure the ways these eight-legged animals move around in forest canopies. Another key ecological process worth investigation is predation, since many birds feed upon insects and spiders living in the canopy, and spiders eat many plant-feeding insects. I will therefore test if predation events govern assemblages of spiders and mites. The currency of this research is species, and goal of the final section of my work is to train taxonomists and to describe unknown species occurring in the study forests, and preliminary work suggests there are species new to science living in forest canopies in SW Quebec.