Invasive Arthropod Monitoring Assesments of Construction and Facility Activities on Maunakea, Hawai‘I
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INVASIVE ARTHROPOD MONITORING ASSESMENTS OF CONSTRUCTION AND FACILITY ACTIVITIES ON MAUNAKEA, HAWAI‘I A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI‘I AT HILO IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF SCIENCE IN TROPICAL CONSERVATION BIOLOGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE JUNE 2018 By: Jorden Alexander Zarders Thesis Committee: Jesse Eiben, Chairperson Frederick Klasner Casper Vanderwoude Keywords: Invasive, Arthropods, Survey, Maunakea, Telescope i Acknowledgements I would like to thank my academic advisor, Jesse Eiben, the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo, College of Agriculture Forestry and Natural Resource Management, Office of Maunakea Management, the Tropical Conservation Biology and Environmental Science faculty and students, and the Big Island Invasive Species Committee. I would also like to thank Dominique Zarders, Darcy Yogi, Frederick Klasner, Ersel Hensley, Casper Vanderwoude, Julien Pétillon, Mitchell Zarders, Valerie Roberts, Sebastian Roberts, Jessica Kirkpatrick and Stephanie Nagata. ii Table of Contents Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................. ii Table of Contents ............................................................................................................... iii List of Tables ..................................................................................................................... iv List of Figures ..................................................................................................................... v Abstract ............................................................................................................................... 1 Section 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................ 4 1.1 Alpine Invasive Species Management ...................................................................... 4 1.2 Project Purpose ......................................................................................................... 6 Section 2 Materials and Methods ........................................................................................ 8 2.1 Alpine Survey Areas ................................................................................................. 9 2.2 Subalpine Survey Areas .......................................................................................... 10 2.3 Lower Elevation Survey Areas ............................................................................... 11 Hilo Town Sites ........................................................................................................ 12 Waimea Town Sites .................................................................................................. 12 South Slope, Maunakea Access Road Sites .............................................................. 13 2.3 Arthropod Sampling ............................................................................................... 14 Subalpine and Alpine Sampling Protocols ............................................................... 14 Lower Elevation Sampling Protocols ....................................................................... 16 2.4 Vehicle Pathway Decontamination Assessments ................................................... 17 2.5 Arthropod Processing and Identification ................................................................ 19 2.6 Data Analyses ......................................................................................................... 21 Section 3 Results ............................................................................................................... 23 3.1 Alpine and Subalpine Arthropod Monitoring Statistics ......................................... 23 Species Accumulation Curves .................................................................................. 25 3.3 Alpine Arthropod Diversity Comparisons .............................................................. 29 3.4 Subalpine Arthropod Diversity Comparisons ......................................................... 30 3.5 Alpine and Subalpine Trapping Technique Comparisons ...................................... 31 3.6 Low Elevation Survey Assessments ....................................................................... 34 Hilo Town ................................................................................................................. 34 Waimea Town ........................................................................................................... 35 South Slope, Maunakea Access Road Sites .............................................................. 35 3.7 Vehicle Pathway Species Detections ...................................................................... 36 3.8 Vehicle Pathway Cleaning Assessment .................................................................. 36 Section 4 Discussion ......................................................................................................... 39 4.1 Threat Detections: Alpine and Subalpine ............................................................... 39 4.2 Monitoring Methods: Alpine and Subalpine .......................................................... 41 4.3 Threat Detections: Low Elevation .......................................................................... 43 4.4 Vehicle Pathway Assessments ................................................................................ 45 Section 5 Conclusions & Recommendations .................................................................... 48 Appendices ........................................................................................................................ 50 References ......................................................................................................................... 55 iii List of Tables Table 1 Summary of arthropod diversity organized by sampling effort ...................24 Table 2 Summary of threat and non-threat taxa diversity organized by sampling effort ..............................................................................................25 Table 3 Summary of threat taxa detection organized by trap ...................................26 Table 4 ANOVA of arthropod threat and non-threat abundance and richness comparisons at the Alpine ..............................................................................30 Table 5 ANOVA of arthropod threat and non-threat abundance and richness comparisons at the Subalpine ........................................................................31 Table 6 ANOVA of arthropod threat and non-threat richness between sampling types ..............................................................................................32 Table 7 Summary of survey sample effort, and incidence of ants at source points .............................................................................................................33 Table 8 Summary of ant species occurrence by sampling method per wash type .................................................................................................................36 Table 9 Fishers Exact Test for ant incidence for regulated and unregulated vehicles .........................................................................................................37 Table 10 Descriptions of trapping methods used for pathway survey assessment .....................................................................................................54 iv List of Figures Figure 1 Map detailing the invasive arthropod study locations ................................10 Figure 2 Images of two trapping methods by BIISC staff ........................................14 Figure 3 Ant survey methods along the Maunakea Access Road transects ..............17 Figure 4 Ant sampling methods used to inspect vehicles ................................................... 19 Figure 5 Morphospecies accumulation curves for all taxa for all sampling events ............................................................................................................26 Figure 6 Morphospecies accumulation curves for threat and non-threat taxa for Subalpine .................................................................................................27 Figure 7 Morphospecies accumulation curves for threat and non-threat taxa for the Alpine sampling ................................................................................28 Figure 8 Morphospecies accumulation curves for threat and non-threat taxa for the Sporadic Alpine Traps .......................................................................29 Figure 9 High Elevation Trapping Technique Arthropod Detection Proportion .....................................................................................................33 Figure 10 Total numbers of traps (a) and percent incidence (b) of ants detected for surveys at sites and facilities .....................................................38 Figure 11 Map of Maunakea Science Reserve sampling locations on Hawai‘i Island .............................................................................................................50 Figure 12 Maps of support facilities ant surveys in Hilo, Hawai‘i ...........................51 Figure 13 Maps of ant surveys at Astronomy Park facilities in Hilo, Hawai‘i ........................................................................................................................51