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Member Symposium

Insects as Sentinels of Change: Unraveling Ecosystem Function and Environmental Shifts

Time-scale trends in leaf litter biodiversity following megafires in California

Tuesday, November 11, 2025
3:25 PM - 3:40 PM Pacific
Location: Oregon Convention Center, B114, OCC
Oral Presentation
In California, anthropogenic climate change and recent extensive land use have shaped the landscape of the state dramatically. For example, eight of the ten most severe wildfires in California’s history have occurred in the last ten years. These high-acreage fires do not reflect historic fire regimes in California, and as such, may impact terrestrial arthropod biodiversity. Using Berlese traps, we sampled leaf litter arthropods from six megafires (defined by the U.S. Interagency Fire Center as wildfires >100,000 acres in area) burned five, ten, and 25 years ago and nearby unburned areas in the Sierran Steppe-Mixed Forest-Coniferous Forest-Alpine Meadow Province (M261 USDA Ecoregion). We use a metabarcoding approach to quantify leaf litter arthropod biodiversity in over 80 samples using three different regions of the barcode gene cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI). To examine trends in long-term arthropod persistence and recovery in areas burned by megafire, we implement the recently developed Community Genetic Distribution (CGD). We also examine this biodiversity in the context of fire severity, allowing for within-fire comparison of biodiversity at different severity levels. We discuss the implications of this work and the utility of leaf litter arthropod biodiversity as a useful metric for detecting the impacts of global change.