This study investigated ant seed removal of Piper sancti‐felicis, an early successional Neotropical shrub. Neotropical Piper are a classic example of bat‐dispersed plants, but we suggest that ants are underappreciated dispersal agents. We identified eleven ant species from the genera Aphaenogaster, Ectatomma, Paratrechina, Pheidole, Trachymyrmex, and Wasmannia recruiting to and harvesting P. sancti‐felicis seeds in forest edge and secondary forest sites at La Selva, Costa Rica. We also tested for differences in ant recruitment to five states in which ants can commonly encounter seeds: unripe fruit, ripe fruit, overripe fruit, bat feces, and cleaned seeds. Overall, ants harvested more seeds from ripe and overripe fruits than other states, but this varied among species. To better understand the mechanisms behind ant preferences for ripe/overripe fruit, we also studied how alkenylphenols, secondary metabolites found in high concentrations in P. sancti‐felicis fruits, affected foraging behavior in one genus of potential ant dispersers, Ectatomma. We found no effects of alkenylphenols on recruitment of Ectatomma to fruits, and thus, these compounds are unlikely to explain differences in ant recruitment among fruits of different maturity. Considering that P. sancti‐felicis seeds have no apparent adaptations for ant dispersal, and few ants removed seeds that were cleaned of pulp, we hypothesize that most ants are harvesting its seeds for the nutritional rewards in the attached pulp. This study emphasizes the importance of ants as important additional dispersers of P. sancti‐felicis and suggests that other non‐myrmecochorous, vertebrate‐dispersed plants may similarly benefit from the recruitment to fruit by ants.

中文翻译：

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在非萌芽性新热带灌木中去除蚂蚁种子：对种子传播的影响

这项研究调查了早期演替新热带灌木Piper sancti-felicis的蚂蚁种子去除。Neotropical Piper是蝙蝠分散植物的经典例子，但我们建议蚂蚁是未被充分认识的分散剂。我们从招募到并收获P. sancti-felicis的Aphaenogaster，Ectatomma，Paratrechina，Pheidole，Trachymyrmex和Wasmannia属中鉴定了11种蚂蚁物种。哥斯达黎加La Selva森林边缘和次生林地的种子。我们还测试了蚂蚁在五个州（蚂蚁通常会遇到种子）的征募差异：未成熟的果实，成熟的果实，未成熟的果实，蝙蝠粪便和清洁的种子。总体而言，蚂蚁从成熟和成熟的果实中收获的种子多于其他州，但这在物种之间有所不同。为了更好地理解成熟/成熟水果的蚂蚁偏好背后的机制，我们还研究了在圣保罗果中高浓度发现的链烯酚，次生代谢产物如何在一种潜在的蚂蚁分散剂Ectatomma中影响觅食行为。我们发现链烯基酚对异位瘤的募集没有影响因此，这些化合物不太可能解释不同成熟果实之间蚂蚁募集的差异。考虑到圣灰果种子对蚂蚁的扩散没有明显的适应性，并且很少有蚂蚁除去了清除果肉的种子，我们假设大多数蚂蚁都在收获其种子，以获取附着果肉的营养奖励。这项研究强调了蚂蚁作为桑氏对虾的重要附加分散剂的重要性，并建议其他非经线虫，脊椎动物分散的植物也可以类似地受益于蚂蚁对果实的吸收。