Study systems
We conducted this study in two sites in Zhejiang Province, East China: i) Tiantong National Forest Park (TT) (29°52′N, 121°39′E), which has a subtropical monsoon climate. The dominant vegetation is subtropical evergreen broad-leaved forest. ii) Putuo island (PT) (29°97′N, 121°38′E), in the Zhoushan archipelago at 6.5 km from the mainland, has a marine subtropical monsoon climate. The island supports evergreen broad-leaved forests dominated by Cyclobalanopsis glauca and mixed evergreen-deciduous broad-leaved forests. On the mainland, Chinese pangolins (Manis pentadactyla ) are critically endangered and no pangolin evidence was observed TT during the two study years. In contrast, in PT the Chinese pangolin population is thriving because of conservation efforts and the island’s isolation from the mainland. In both sites, termites (mainly Coptotermes formosanus, Odontotermes formosanus, Reticulitermes chinensis , Reticulitermes speratus ) are the major deadwood decomposers (Yi et al. 2006). Table 1 has further data for abiotic and biotic features of both sites (see also Yanet al . 2006).