Harvest of wild animals and plants is pervasive, exerts ecological and evolutionary pressure on populations, and is known to drive rapid changes in organismal traits. Although the factors that lead to rapid trait changes have received increased attention, the ecological consequences of harvest‐driven trait changes are less appreciated. We review recent evidence that harvest‐driven trait changes can affect community and ecosystem processes. Growing experimental evidence, modeling studies, and field observations have revealed that common responses to harvest include changes in life‐history and behavioral traits, which have the potential to reshape the ecology of harvested systems. On the basis of existing evidence, we propose a set of general mechanisms that link harvest‐driven trait changes to ecological processes, including trophic cascades, nutrient dynamics, keystone interactions, ecosystem stability, and habitat use. Managing harvested ecosystems sustainably may require strategies that account for harvest‐driven trait changes. We recommend that trait changes be monitored closely as part of ecosystem‐based management plans, especially in cases where targeted traits are known to affect important aspects of ecosystem function.

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Reproduction in iteroparous marine organisms is often timed with abiotic cycles and may follow lunar, tidal amplitude, or daily cycles. Among intertidal marine invertebrates, decapods are well known to time larval release to coincide with large amplitude nighttime tides, which minimizes the risk of predation. Such bimonthly cycles have been reported for few other intertidal invertebrates. We documented the reproduction of 6 gastropod species from Panama to determine whether they demonstrate reproductive cycles, whether these cycles follow a 2‐week cycle, and whether cycles are timed so that larval release occurs during large amplitude tides. Two of the species (Crepidula cf. marginalis and Nerita scabricosta) showed nonuniform reproduction, but without clear peaks in timing relative to tidal or lunar cycles. The other 4 species show clear peaks in reproduction occurring every 2 weeks. In 3 of these species (Cerithideopsis carlifornica var. valida, Littoraria variegata, and Natica chemnitzi), hatching occurred within 4 days of the maximum amplitude tides. Siphonaria palmata exhibit strong cycles, but reproduction occurred during the neap tides. Strong differences in the intensity of reproduction of Cerithideopsis carlifornica, and in particular, Littoraria variegata, between the larger and smaller spring tides of a lunar month indicate that these species time reproduction with the tidal amplitude cycle rather than the lunar cycle. For those species that reproduce during both the wet and dry seasons, we found that reproductive timing did not differ between seasons despite strong differences in temperature and precipitation. Overall, we found that most (4/6) species have strong reproductive cycles synchronized with the tidal amplitude cycle and that seasonal differences in abiotic factors do not alter these cycles.

Local adaptation can cause predator populations to vary in traits and their effects on prey, but few studies have tested whether divergent predator populations respond differently to acute environmental stressors. We tested how Nucella dogwhelks from 3 populations with natural exposure to distinct environmental regimes in the California Current System altered consumption of mussel prey (Mytilus californianus) in ambient (pH 8.0, 429 µatm partial pressure of CO2 [pCO2]) and acidified (pH 7.6, 1032 µatm pCO2) seawater. Overall, experimental acidification increased the variation in consumption time observed among populations. We found reduced consumption time for the population that experienced more frequent exposure to low pH conditions in nature but not for populations with less prior exposure. Exposure to acidification also altered the individual components of consumption time—search time and handling time—depending on source population. These results indicate that impaired predator performance is not a universal response to acidification, that predation responses to acute acidification can be population specific, and that individual population responses may relate to prior exposure. Our study highlights how population-specific responses to climate change can lead to differences in ecological effects that may restructure prey communities at local scales.