Large‐scale distribution patterns of mangrove nematodes: A global meta‐analysis

Abstract

Mangroves harbor diverse invertebrate communities, suggesting that macroecological distribution patterns of habitat‐forming foundation species drive the associated faunal distribution. Whether these are driven by mangrove biogeography is still ambiguous. For small‐bodied taxa, local factors and landscape metrics might be as important as macroecology. We performed a meta‐analysis to address the following questions: (1) can richness of mangrove trees explain macroecological patterns of nematode richness? and (2) do local landscape attributes have equal or higher importance than biogeography in structuring nematode richness? Mangrove areas of Caribbean‐Southwest Atlantic, Western Indian, Central Indo‐Pacific, and Southwest Pacific biogeographic regions. We used random‐effects meta‐analyses based on natural logarithm of the response ratio (lnRR) to assess the importance of macroecology (i.e., biogeographic regions, latitude, longitude), local factors (i.e., aboveground mangrove biomass and tree richness), and landscape metrics (forest area and shape) in structuring nematode richness from 34 mangroves sites around the world. Latitude, mangrove forest area, and forest shape index explained 19% of the heterogeneity across studies. Richness was higher at low latitudes, closer to the equator. At local scales, richness increased slightly with landscape complexity and decreased with forest shape index. Our results contrast with biogeographic diversity patterns of mangrove‐associated taxa. Global‐scale nematode diversity may have evolved independently of mangrove tree richness, and diversity of small‐bodied metazoans is probably more closely driven by latitude and associated climates, rather than local, landscape, or global biogeographic patterns.

Introductory Chapter: Mangrove Ecosystem Research Trends - Where has the Focus been So Far

“…Search results from Web of Science show that majority of Past studies have showed that literature review could provide important research outputs. In mangroves research, many studies in different fields have been done through literature reviews [36][37][38][39][40]. Number of publication records for keywords "mangrove invertebrate," "mangrove polycheat," "mangrove bird," and "mangrove mammal" from 1981 to 2017.…”

First Assessment of the Benthic Meiofauna Sensitivity to Low Human-Impacted Mangroves in French Guiana

“…Thus, mangrove nematodes are known from a large variety of other different ecosystems worldwide, characterized by large fluctuations in environmental conditions [34]. If any nematode endemic genera are reported for mangroves, some genera are considered typically dominant in mangroves worldwide [34,35]. Previous studies have shown that nematode assemblages differ according to the type of disturbance due to certain nematode-specific tolerances [36,37].…”

Habitat Attributes Dictate the Roles of Dispersal and Environmental Filtering on Metacommunity Assembly at Coastal Soft-Bottom Ecosystems

“…Despite being adjacent environments with a strong interrelationship, mangroves, tidal flats, and sandy beaches hosted nematode metacommunities with different species composition. Indeed, the dominant species observed on each habitat were those commonly reported for mangroves (Pinto et al 2013;Brustolin et al 2018), tidal flats (Vieira and Fonseca 2013;Fonseca and Netto 2015), and sandy beaches (Gheskiere et al 2004;Gheskiere et al 2005;Maria et al 2013). Assemblages from each habitat were related to different environmental variables pointing to environmental filtering as an important mechanism of metacommunity assembly for coastal soft-bottom communities at the landscape scale.…”

“…Aside from the differences in habitat specialization or abiotic tolerance, the consequent pattern of nested subsets observed for the mangrove fauna might be a result of interspecific differences in dispersal ability and the colonization/extinction dynamics (Presley 2020). Differences in the size and complexity of drainage basins and mangrove forests (Brustolin et al 2018) might affect richness at larger-scales (Huxham et al 2010;Watt and Scrosati 2013). These results suggest that larger forests and drainage basins can operate as hot-spots of nematode species richness, while smaller and more isolated mangroves are cold-spots that harbor smaller subsets of those species adapted to mangrove environmental conditions.…”