| dc.description.abstract | The conversion of forest to agricultural areas is usually associated with loss in biodiversity and its associated ecosystem services. However, some agricultural system such as agroforestry can conserve biodiversity through supporting suitable habitat which are similar to natural condition. The aim of this research is to study community structure of Coleoptera in cacao agroforestry system with emphasize on the effect of age and habitat condition surrounding cacao plantation. Ecological research was conducted in cacao plantation in Central Sulawesi with different type of shade trees i.e remaining forest trees (plot B), planted trees with diverse species (plot C) and planted trees with only 1 or 2 species (plot D). This research monitors the changes of biodiversity that had been conducted in 2003 and resampled in 2009 with the same method in the same plots as well as the same sampling time. In each agroforestry types, four trees were sampled and all the Coleoptera were collected using fogging method. The result of the research showed that the species richness of Coleoptera from three types of agroforestry decreased in composition and structure among the two time period. In 2003, there were 172 species compared to 111 species in 2009. However, there are not significant different between 2003 and 2009 species composition based on analysis of variance using Shannon index. In contrast, similarity analysis using Sorenson index showed that the species composition changed between 2003 and 2009. Age of cacao trees have important role on changing Coleoptera species composition. In addition, habitat condition with natural forest may support Coleoptera diversity in cacao plantation. | en |
