Aim: Mountains harbour a rich and non-random cluster of species, yet knowledge of the species' biological attributes that support their coexistence in the montane community is limited. Here, we investigated the association of species occurrence on the Tibetan Plateau with their morphological, ecological or evolutionary constraints. Location: Tibetan Plateau (TP).Taxon: Mammals and birds. Methods:We tested whether species occurrence on the TP correlates with morphological, ecological or evolutionary constraints using the spatial distribution, phylogeny, dispersal ability and thermal niche property data for 1353 terrestrial vertebrates (383 mammals and 970 birds). We used standard (non-phylogenetic) and phylogenetic logistic regressions to elucidate the relative contributions of these attributes of species to explaining their occurrence on the TP. We assessed the geographical patterns of the community structures on the TP and fitted linear mixed models to explore the underlying eco-evolutionary forces. Results:The TP species exhibited a higher cold tolerance, wider thermal niche breadth and higher rate of niche evolution than non-TP species. We supported the assumption that the TP species were not a random subset from the species pool, but were structured jointly by environmental filtering and dispersal limitation. While dispersal and ecological processes underlying species assemblages varied spatially and among taxa, we found that species in stressful environments were limited by environmental filtering, whereas dispersal limitation was more pronounced under favourable climatic conditions.Main conclusions: Our study finds that environmental filtering and dispersal limitation jointly shape the species assemblage on the TP. These findings provide significant insights into community assembly processes on the TP and other montane ecosystems on Earth, especially those that are sensitive to global warming.

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The biotas of Taiwan and Hainan Islands are of continental origin, but the manner with which historical and ecological factors shaped these insular species is still unclear. Here, we used freshwater fish as a model to fill this gap by quantifying the phylogenetic structure of the insular faunas and disentangling the relative contribution of potential drivers. Firstly, we used clustering and ordination analyses to identify regional species pools. To test whether the insular freshwater fish faunas were phylogenetically clustered or overdispersed, we calculated the net relatedness index (NRI) and the nearest taxon index (NTI). Finally, we implemented logistic regressions to disentangle the relative importance of species attributes (i.e. maximum body length, climatic niche dissimilarity, and diversification) and historical connectivity in explaining the insular faunas. Our results showed that the most possible species pools of Taiwan are Zhejiang and Fujian provinces, and those of Hainan are Guangdong and Guangxi provinces. These insular faunas showed random phylogenetic structures in terms of NRI values. According to the NTI values, however, the Taiwanese fauna displayed more phylogenetic clustering, while the Hainanese one was more overdispersed. Both the standard and phylogenetic logistic regressions identified historical connectivity and climatic niche dissimilarity as the two top explanatory variables for species assemblages on these islands. Our reconstruction of the paleo-connected drainage basins provides insight into how historical processes and ecological factors interact to shape the freshwater fish fauna of the East Asian islands.