Abstract:
The diversity of riparian ground beetles at three altitudes (Low: 400-1100m a.s.l., Mid: 1100-
1800 m a.s.l., High: 1800-2500 m a.s.l.) in Uluguru Mountains was investigated. The samples of ground beetles
were collected by active searching method from nine sites between May and June 2012. A total of 3261
specimens of ground beetles representing 13 subfamilies and 29 species were recorded. Ground beetle
abundance, species richness and diversity were analyzed statistically using Diversity and Richness–2.65,
PRIMER 6 and SYSTAT Version 10 software. The abundance of ground beetles was low at mid altitude (n =
499) and high at low and high altitudes (n = 1988; n = 774 respectively). There was significant variation in
ground beetle abundance among the three altitudes (Kruskal-Wallis H=84.533, p<0.05). The most abundant
species, Trechodes babaulti, was abundant at low and high altitudes (n=1534; 47.04% and n=501; 15.36% of
the collected beetles respectively). Both species richness and Shannon-Wiener index of diversity (H') of ground
beetles varied between low, mid and high altitudes with the highest species richness and diversity found at mid
altitude. Pairwise comparison showed a significant difference in diversity of ground beetle species for all three
pairs (high/mid, high/low & mid/low) of altitudes (p<0.05).
