Hunting habits die hard: Conserved prey preferences in army ants across two distant neotropical rainforests

Army ants are widely recognized as keystone species in neotropical rainforests due to their role as important arthropod predators. Their large-scale raids involve thousands of workers scouring the forest floor in pursuit of prey, primarily capturing other invertebrates. Up to 20 species of army ants coexist in a rainforest, and dietary niche differentiation has been proposed as a mechanism to alleviate competition among them. Based on only a handful of study sites, however, our understanding of the precise dietary preferences and the extent of niche differentiation remains notably limited. In this study, we aimed to expand our knowledge of army ant communities by resolving an Ecuadorian predation network consisting of 244 prey species and 13 army ant species representing the five known neotropical army ant genera: Cheliomyrmex, Eciton, Labidus, Neivamyrmex, and Nomamyrmex. We collected 2156 prey items from 180 army ant raids/emigrations, and of these, we identified 1945 prey items to th..., The study was carried out at the Reserva Río Canandé (0.5263 N, -79.2129 E) in Ecuador during April to June 2018, February to May 2019, and September to October 2021. The research area was characterized by a mosaic of primary and secondary forests, agricultural land, pastures, and monocultural cocoa plantations. We collected prey of 13 army ant species and identified the prey based on morphological identification and DNA barcode analysis. For details see the associated publication., , # Hunting habits die hard: Conserved prey preferences in neotropical army ants across distant neotropical rainforests

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.zcrjdfnkc](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.zcrjdfnkc)

The deposited file (denoted as Dryad file 1) provides supplemental information to the article \"Hunting habits die hard: Conserved prey preferences in neotropical army ants across distant neotropical rainforests\".

## Description of the data and file structure

Dryad file S1: Provides information about prey items, including GenBank accession numbers of DNA barcodes, BOLD process IDs and BIN numbers, collection information, information on associated army ants, prey identification and prey life stages, network matrices, and the number of BINs per species. Abbreviations: NA: data not available, which can refer to any missing data, including missing DNA barcode data, missing information on taxonomic identification, missing geographic coordinates, and missing information on lifestage details.
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