Abstract
Kerangas forest, is a distinct vegetation around the tropics. It has a highly acidic soils and low nutrition contents. This condition lead to a uniqueness of its community member, as shown by Nepenthes spp. Nepenthes spp. are carnivorous plants which use insect as their nitrogen source. This research aimed to predict the role of Nepenthes spp. of kerangas forest towards insect through insect composition in the pitchers of Nepenthes spp.. This was a descriptive qualitative research. Research was conducted during May, 2018 in kerangas forest of Tuing, Bangka. Eight 10m x 10m plots were placed by purposive sampling. Results showed that there were 266 insects found in 23 Nepenthes spp. pitchers, identified as Ordo Coleoptera, Diptera, Hymenoptera, and Orthoptera. There was no difference between composition of aerial and terrestrial pitcher. Insects found grouped as beneficial insect, pollinator, and others. Alive Culicidae larvae was the most abundant insect found within its’ pitchers. It showed the Nepenthes spp. role in kerangas forest as a potential mini-habitat for aquatic larvae. Nevertheless, further study is needed to prove regarding temporal variation in liquid composition in Nepenthes spp. pitcher.
Keywords: insect, kerangas, Nepenthes spp., role
Authors
Media Konservasi is an open access journal, meaning that all content is freely available without charge to the user or their institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without needing to request prior permission from the publisher or the author.
All articles published by Media Konservasi are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. This allows for unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided proper credit is given to the original authors.
Authors submitting manuscripts should understand and agree that the copyright of published manuscripts is retained by the authors. Copyright encompasses the exclusive rights of authors to reproduce, distribute, and sell any part of the journal articles in all forms and media. Reproduction of any part of this journal, its storage in databases, and its transmission by any form or media is allowed without written permission from Media Konservasi.
