Use of ants to monitor environmental impacts of salt spray from a mine in arid Australia

The habitat preferences, seasonal activity cycles and optimum sampling protocols of an ant community in the Australian arid zone were assessed by pitfall trapping. Diversity and abundance of ants peaked in the hotter summer months and varied greatly between different habitats. Sand dunes vegetated with tall perennial shrubs proved to be the most useful habitat for environmental monitoring using ants. Dominant and genera were suppressed by environmental stresses caused by salt spray from an underground mine. Remediation of the salt spray resulted in a general, yet inconsistent, recolonization of dominant ants at the expense of opportunistic genera. A greater understanding of the ecology of key ant species is required before ants can be used as unequivocal indicators of environmental condition at the Olympic Dam mine site.