Bananas and plantains are major commodity/food crops that represent an important habitat for earthworms, although so far, no review is available on earthworm communities associated with banana/plantain crops worldwide. The Vale do Ribeira region is among the largest banana producing areas in Brazil, but little is known of the earthworms living there. Hence, the present study assessed earthworm populations and species in three banana plantations and adjacent Atlantic forest fragments along the Ribeira de Iguape River using standard (hand sorting) methodologies. Furthermore, we review earthworm populations reported in banana/plantain plantations worldwide. Only two species (Pontoscolex corethrurus, Amynthas gracilis) belonging to two families (Rhinodrilidae, Megascolecidae) were found in the Ribeira River valley, occurring concurrently. Abundance was low (< 13 indiv. m-2) compared with other banana plantations worldwide, that frequently surpassed 100 indiv. m-2. More than 70 studies reported earthworms from >200 banana plantations in 28 countries, and mean species richness was 2.7 per site, ranging from 1 to 10 species. Exotics predominated in most sites and P. corethrurus was the most prevalent species encountered. Overall, more than 104 species from 10 families were reported, with around 61 native and 43 exotic widespread species, mainly of the Megascolecidae, Lumbricidae and Acanthodrilidae families. Richness was highest in India (27 spp.) and the Canary Islands (25 spp.), but native species dominated only in a few countries and sites, while exotics were prevalent especially in island countries and Brazil. Lower-input practices appear to be important for earthworm communities and banana plantations can have large earthworm populations in some cases, which may be contributing to soil processes and plant production, topics that deserve further attention. However, many important banana-producing countries have not yet been evaluated, so further work is warranted, both in terms of applied ecology and biodiversity.

中文翻译：

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芭蕉属 (Musa spp.) 中的蚯蚓种类。巴西和世界各地的种植园


香蕉和大蕉是主要的商品/粮食作物，代表了蚯蚓的重要栖息地，尽管到目前为止，还没有对全世界与香蕉/大蕉作物相关的蚯蚓群落进行审查。里贝拉谷地区是巴西最大的香蕉产区之一，但人们对生活在那里的蚯蚓知之甚少。因此，本研究使用标准（手工分选）方法评估了里贝拉德伊瓜佩河沿岸三个香蕉种植园和邻近大西洋森林碎片中的蚯蚓种群和物种。此外，我们还回顾了世界各地香蕉/大蕉种植园报告的蚯蚓数量。在里贝拉河谷仅发现了属于两个科（Rhinodridilidae、Megascolecidae）的两个物种（Pontoscolex corethrurus、Amynthas gracilis），并且同时发生。与世界上其他经常超过 100 个个体的香蕉种植园相比，丰度较低（< 13 个个体 m-2）。 m-2。 70 多项研究报告了来自 28 个国家 >200 香蕉种植园的蚯蚓，每个地点的平均物种丰富度为 2.7，从 1 到 10 种不等。外来物种在大多数地点占主导地位，而 P. corethrurus 是遇到的最普遍的物种。总体而言，报告了来自 10 个科的超过 104 种物种，其中约 61 种本地物种和 43 种外来广泛分布物种，主要是巨蚓科、蚓科和棘突虫科。印度（27 种）和加那利群岛（25 种）的丰富度最高，但本地物种仅在少数国家和地区占主导地位，而外来物种则很普遍，尤其是在岛国和巴西。 低投入做法似乎对蚯蚓群落很重要，在某些情况下，香蕉种植​​园可能有大量蚯蚓，这可能有助于土壤过程和植物生产，这些话题值得进一步关注。然而，许多重要的香蕉生产国尚未得到评估，因此有必要在应用生态学和生物多样性方面开展进一步的工作。