Abstract: 【Aim】To investigate the diversity and seasonal dynamics of ground-dwelling ant communities in three habitats in Lishui District, Nanjing, East China.【Methods】A one-year seasonal sampling was conducted from August 2020 to July 2021 in three different sampling habitats (farmland, grassland and plantation forest) in Lishui District, Nanjing, and the individual density, species number, Simpson dominance index, Shannon-Wiener diversity index, Pielou’s evenness index and Jaccard similarity coefficient of grounddwelling ant communities, and the seasonal dynamics of each index in these three habitats were investigated.【Results】During August 2020 to July 2021, the dominant species of ground-dwelling ants in farmland in Lishui District, Nanjing were Tetramorium caespitum (490 individuals, 58.75%), Ochetellus glaber (116 individuals, 13.91%) and Formica japonica (98 individuals, 11.75%), those in grassland were T. caespitum (427 individuals, 58.17%) and Nylanderia bourbonica (110 individuals, 14.99%), and those in plantation forest were T. caespitum (240 individuals, 27.18%), F. japonica (121 individuals, 13.70%), N. sharpii (98 individuals, 11.10%) and Pristomyrmex punctatus (90 individuals, 10.19%). The numbers of species and individuals in ground-dwelling ant communities varied significantly between habitats, with the highest numbers of species and individuals (29 species, 883 individuals) collected from plantation forest and the lowest numbers of species and individuals (19 species, 734 individuals) collected from grassland. The analysis of variance showed that seasonal changes had a significant effect on the number of species and individual density of ground-dwelling ants in this region, while habitat changes had a significant effect on the number of species and no significant effect on the individual density, but there was no interactive effect of both seasonal and habitat changes on the number of species and individual density of ground-dwelling ants in this region. The analysis of community diversity showed that the seasonal trends in the Shannon-Wiener diversity index, Pielou’s evenness index and Simpson dominance index of the ground-dwelling ant communities in the three different habitats were basically the same, with an increasing trend followed by a decreasing trend, while the seasonal trends of the Simpson dominance index and Pielou’s evenness index were basically opposite. The Jaccard similarity coefficients of the ground-dwelling ant communities between farmland and grassland, farmland and plantation forest, and grassland and plantation forest were 0.73, 0.52 and 0.52, respectively, which were moderately similar to each other, while those of the grounddwelling ant communities between different months were low, and most of them were extremely dissimilar. 【Conclusion】The numbers of individuals and species in the ground-dwelling ant communities in Lishui District, Nanjing are relatively rich, and the structure of the ground-dwelling ant communities is significantly influenced by habitat type changes and seasonal changes, so attention should be paid to strengthen the protection of ant species resources in the region in different seasons.

Key words: Ground-dwelling ant, habitat, seasonal dynamics, community diversity, community similarity