A synthesis of land use impacts on stream biodiversity across metrics and scales

Petsch, Danielle Katharine; Blowes, Shane A.; Melo, Adriano S.; Chase, Jonathan M.

doi:10.1002/ecy.3498

Cited by 42 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 98 publications

(163 reference statements)

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“…Importantly, unoccupied sites were almost exclusively reported in streams in the more agricultural eastern part of the study area, which is also known to be more heavily affected by pesticide run-offs, which can be detrimental to stream amphipod communities (Burdon et al, 2019;Zubrod et al, 2014). There, we also observed two streams that were almost completely unoccupied throughout the whole study, strongly suggesting more intense or persistent anthropogenic disturbances preventing colonization efforts (Petsch et al, 2021). Though we speculate unfavorable water conditions to at least partially explain the observed patterns, we acknowledge that more targeted studies would be required to understand the mechanisms behind the absence of these shredders.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

“…Our results suggest that anthropogenic disturbances and intense terrestrial land use play a direct role in destabilizing amphipod assemblages. It is well recognized that agricultural landscapes and their associated human activities can modify freshwater ecosystems and promote changes in aquatic communities (Cook et al, 2018; Petsch et al, 2021). On the one hand, increased amplitudes of fluctuations, as observed in some streams, can be an early warning that precedes the sudden transition of a community to a new state (Carpenter et al, 2011; Scheffer et al, 2009), or they could be the manifestation of continuous but stochastic recolonization from forested sites.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Spatiotemporal dynamics in freshwater amphipod assemblages are associated with surrounding terrestrial land use type

Cereghetti

Altermatt

2023

Ecosphere

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Biological assemblages are the result of dynamic processes that have explicit temporal and spatial dimensions. Although biodiversity patterns can be directly inferred from the structure of these assemblages, an assessment of changes through time and space is needed to understand how organisms initially assembled and how they are responding to local environmental and biotic factors. Small freshwater streams are particularly affected by contemporary anthropogenic activities and biological invasions, yet they are commonly less studied, as studies often focus on lakes and large streams. Here, we conducted a spatially explicit analysis of keystone shredder assemblages across eight years in 12 replicated small tributary streams. In each stream, we monitored multiple sites per kilometer of stream length. By assessing temporal beta diversity dynamics, defined by the gain or loss of species or abundance per species at individual sites, we show that changes in amphipod assemblages occur within the context of the surrounding terrestrial matrix and reflect recent amphipod colonization history. While amphipod composition was mostly constant in streams located in forested catchments, streams embedded in catchments with more extensive agricultural land use displayed more pronounced temporal changes, either driven by colonization of unoccupied upstream locations or by more pronounced but undirected fluctuations in gains and losses of species or abundance per species. Our study thus suggests that agricultural landscapes might destabilize aquatic amphipod assemblages, causing higher temporal changes in community structures and highlighting the vulnerability of aquatic ecosystems to terrestrial land use drivers.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatiotemporal dynamics in freshwater amphipod assemblages are associated with surrounding terrestrial land use type

Cereghetti

Altermatt

2023

Ecosphere

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“…The contrasting relationship in β-diversity between forested and modified streams in our system might also be plausibly due to the fact that the different modified land uses selected distinct tolerant taxa resulting from increased environmental disparity among land use types, although we did not particularly evaluate this possibility. Modified streams exhibit high environmental heterogeneity resulting from high Frontiers in Environmental Science frontiersin.org environmental differentiation among land uses (Barboza et al, 2015;Petsch et al, 2021b), leading to marked community colonization by taxa acclimatized to the prevailing local conditions (Siqueira et al, 2015;Petsch et al, 2021b). It is therefore possible that land use differentiation in other local environmental parameters we did not measure in our study may likely regulate the relationship.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Ecological studies of effects of land use on stream β-diversity have either documented a decrease in β-diversity (biotic homogenization; Passy and Blanchet 2007;Maloney et al, 2011;Siqueira et al, 2015), an increase in β-diversity (biotic differentiation; Hawkins et al, 2015;Liborio et al, 2016;Fugère et al, 2016;Roa-Fuentes et al, 2019) or a weak relationship with no clear trend (Larsen and Ormerod 2014;Petsch et al, 2021a;Keke et al, 2021b;Petsch et al, 2021b). We found a negative relationship between land use and β-diversity of urban + agric streams, where land use diminished β-diversity-a process widely known as biotic homogenization.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biotic homogenization of stream macroinvertebrates in an Afrotropical Anthropocene: Land use and ecological correlates

Keke

Arimoro

Edegbene

et al. 2022

Front. Environ. Sci.

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Land use modification is a notable cause of biodiversity loss in streams. However, the impacts of anthropogenic forest conversion on β-diversity are difficult to forecast, especially in Afrotropical stream ecosystem, mainly because: 1) empirical research is scant, and; 2) the few available studies provide conflicting findings. In our study, we used techniques of decomposing β-diversity to evaluate the influence of land use changes on macroinvertebrates β-diversity of 66 stream sites in an Afrotropical Anthropocene. We also evaluated the potential exclusive and shared contributions of ecological drivers of community composition and β-diversity. Our total β-diversity for both forested and modified streams was driven mainly by the turnover component, while the nestedness-resultant component was negligible. The dominance of turnover in both forested and modified streams in our systems stresses the urgency to protect many sites in order to conserve γ-diversity. While β-diversity diminished in our urban + agric streams in relation to our forest streams, leading to a process of biotic homogenization, β-diversity of our forest streams was similar to that of the urban streams, implying that land use does not necessarily lead to a process of biotic homogenization. The contrasting findings about relationships between land use and β-diversity in our study showed that the effects of land use on β-diversity can be variable and context-dependent. Larger parts of variation in community composition and β-diversity were accounted for by the local environmental conditions (through environmental filtering) and land use, while geographical spatial factors (through dispersal limitation) explained little part of variation in our system–highlighting the importance of species sorting (environmental filtering) over dispersal-related processes in metacommunity organization.

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“…Urbanisation has led to an unprecedented decline in freshwater biodiversity, such as species diversity and functional diversity, worldwide (Barnum et al, 2017;Petsch et al, 2021;Wang et al, 2012).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Species sensitivity and functional uniqueness determine the response of macroinvertebrate functional diversity to species loss in urban streams

et al. 2023

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1. Land-use change, particularly urbanisation, has led to an unprecedented decline in species and functional diversity worldwide. However, the mechanism through which such species loss affects functional diversity remains unclear. Here, we aimed to elucidate this mechanism from the perspectives of the association between species sensitivity and functional uniqueness (i.e., their relative contribution to functional diversity) and their related functional traits.2. We collected stream macroinvertebrates and measured environmental and landuse variables from 152 sites in the highly urbanised Qiantang River Basin in the Zhejiang Province of eastern China. Firstly, we evaluated the sensitivity to urbanisation and functional uniqueness of each macroinvertebrate taxon to identify their association patterns. Secondly, we examined the decline in functional diversity in response to taxon loss by comparing simulated ordered and random taxon loss scenarios. Finally, we identified sensitivity-related traits (SRT) and functional uniqueness-related traits (URT) using the Mann-Whitney U-test to elucidate their role in shaping functional response patterns to taxon loss.3. Urbanisation showed a remarkable effect on the taxonomic and functional diversity of macroinvertebrates. Functional diversity declined nonlinearly with taxon loss, with the threshold response shifting to a rapid decline after 29.7%-60.0% taxa were lost. The sensitivities of ephemeropteran, plecopteran and trichopteran taxa (EPT) were negatively associated with their functional uniqueness, although this association was not detected when considering all macroinvertebrates. We identified 11 SRT and nine URT, but only one URT overlapped SRT.4. The association between species sensitivity and its functional uniqueness shapes functional decline patterns in response to taxon loss. Overlap patterns of SRT and URT offer novel insights into mechanisms underlying stress-induced decline in functional diversity.5. The process of functional diversity decline in response to species loss caused by urbanisation also may be affected by species turnover or even compensated for by non-native species in real world ecosystems. How functional diversity responds to species loss remains an open topic that needs to be cautiously addressed.

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A synthesis of land use impacts on stream biodiversity across metrics and scales

Cited by 42 publications

References 98 publications

Spatiotemporal dynamics in freshwater amphipod assemblages are associated with surrounding terrestrial land use type

Spatiotemporal dynamics in freshwater amphipod assemblages are associated with surrounding terrestrial land use type

Biotic homogenization of stream macroinvertebrates in an Afrotropical Anthropocene: Land use and ecological correlates

Species sensitivity and functional uniqueness determine the response of macroinvertebrate functional diversity to species loss in urban streams

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