Phylogenetic ecology and the greening of cities

MacIvor, J. Scott; Cadotte, Marc W.; Livingstone, Stuart W.; Lundholm, Jeremy; Yasui, Simone-Louise E.

doi:10.1111/1365-2664.12667

Cited by 33 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 91 publications

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“…While MacIvor et al . () pointed out that the phylogenetic relationships of plant species should be considered when designing urban green infrastructures, our results show that we have to especially focus our efforts on protecting threatened native species and their habitats in order to safeguard phylogenetic diversity. For the flora of Halle (the same data set as used here) and by using a functional approach, we had identified the habitat conditions related to extirpation in a previous study (Knapp et al .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Increasing species richness but decreasing phylogenetic richness and divergence over a 320‐year period of urbanization

Knapp

Winter

Klotz

2016

Journal of Applied Ecology

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Summary Urbanization is increasing faster than ever, contributing to a global extinction crisis. Recently, scientists have debated whether species richness on local and regional scales is mostly declining, but long‐term changes in phylogenetic richness and divergence were largely disregarded. Space‐for‐time approaches revealed that plant phylogenetic divergence is lower in urban than in non‐urban areas. However, such approaches cannot fully disentangle the relative importance of the biotic processes that drive temporal changes in diversity. Using a unique European urban flora covering 320 years in seven time steps, combined with a comprehensive plant phylogeny, we examined (i) how species richness changed with urbanization over time; (ii) whether trends in phylogenetic richness and divergence parallel trends in species richness; and (iii) whether species extirpation or immigration is driving these changes. We found that over time urban species richness increased, but phylogenetic richness and divergence decreased. Extirpations of phylogenetically distinct native species and immigrations of phylogenetically common native and non‐native species caused a non‐random loss of phylogenetic diversity. Our analyses suggest that if future extirpations and immigrations continue to follow the patterns observed over history, this loss will continue. Synthesis and applications. Measures to protect phylogenetic diversity should combine the protection of threatened habitats and their species with the maintenance of habitats that mitigate heat and safeguard evolutionary history. Urban planners should consider a phylogenetically diverse set of species when designing green spaces.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Increasing species richness but decreasing phylogenetic richness and divergence over a 320‐year period of urbanization

Knapp

Winter

Klotz

2016

Journal of Applied Ecology

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“…Functional traits provide a more mechanistic understanding of how species respond to environmental conditions (McGill, Enquist, Weiher, & Westoby, 2006) and can be more informative when monitoring impacts of land-use on biodiversity (Vandewalle et al, 2010;Williams et al, 2009). These measures of community composition can better identify species-specific differences and therefore improve GI design urban biodiversity (MacIvor, Cadotte, Livingstone, Lundholm, & Yasui, 2016).…”

Section: Gi Type and Taxa-specific Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The contribution of constructed green infrastructure to urban biodiversity: A synthesis and meta‐analysis

Filazzola

Shrestha

MacIvor

2019

Journal of Applied Ecology

153

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The development of buildings and other infrastructure in cities is viewed as a threat to local biodiversity and ecosystem functioning because natural habitat is replaced. However, there is momentum for implementing green infrastructure (GI), such as green roofs, wetland detention basins and community gardens, that partially offset these impacts and that benefit human health. GI is often designed to explicitly support ecosystem services, including implied benefits to biodiversity. The effects of GI on biodiversity have been rarely quantified, but research on this topic has increased exponentially in the last decade and a synthesis of the literature is needed. Here, we examined 1,883 published manuscripts and conducted a meta‐analysis on 33 studies that were relevant. We determined whether GI provides additional benefits to biodiversity over conventional infrastructure or natural counterparts. We also highlighted research gaps and identified opportunities to improve future applications. We determined that GI significantly improves biodiversity over conventional infrastructure equivalents, and that in some cases GI had comparable measures of biodiversity to natural counterparts. Many studies were omitted from these analyses because we found GI research has generally neglected conventional experimental design frameworks, including controls, replication or adequate sampling effort. Synthesis and applications. Our synthesis identified that taxa specificity is an important consideration for green infrastructure (GI) design relative to the more common measurements at the community level. We also identified that ignoring multi‐trophic interactions and landscape‐level patterns can limit our understanding of GI effects on biodiversity. We recommend further examination of species‐specific differences among infrastructures (i.e. green, conventional or natural equivalents) or using functional traits to improve the efficacy of GI implementation on urban biodiversity. Furthermore, we encourage policy makers and practitioners to improve the design of GI to benefit urban ecosystems because of the potential benefits for both humans and global biodiversity.

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“…An increasing number of studies aim to investigate the use of locally occurring native plant communities on green roofs (Butler et al, 2012;Heim & Lundholm, 2014;Simmons, 2015). Interpreting the phylogenetic community structure of species pools adapted to local microclimatic conditions that are similar to those experienced on green roofs, depending on spatial and temporal scale (Kraft, Cornwell, Webb, & Ackerly, 2007), could inform ecological design (Lundholm, 2006;MacIvor, Margolis, et al, 2016;MacIvor, Cadotte, et al, 2016). For example, a designed plant community could be based around one or a few key high-performing plant species, then other species added in order to maximize the community PD.…”

Section: Management Implicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Phylogenetic diversity (hereafter referred to as PD) in plant communities has been considered in the implementation of ecological restoration (Hipp et al, 2015) and green infrastructure (MacIvor, Margolis, et al, 2016;MacIvor, Cadotte, Livingstone, Lundholm, & Yasui, 2016). However, very few studies have manipulated PD and demonstrated an impact on ecosystem services (Cadotte, 2013;Narwani, Matthews, Fox, & Venail, 2015).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Manipulating plant phylogenetic diversity for green roof ecosystem service delivery

MacIvor

Sookhan

Arnillas

et al. 2018

Evolutionary Applications

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Plant species and functional trait diversity have each been shown to improve green roof services. Species and trait differences that contribute to ecosystem services are the product of past evolutionary change and phylogenetic diversity (PD), which quantifies the relatedness among species within a community. In this study, we present an experimental framework to assess the contribution of plant community PD for green roof ecosystem service delivery, and data from one season that support our hypotheses that PD would be positively correlated with two services: building cooling and rainwater management. Using 28 plant species in 12 families, we created six community combinations with different levels of PD. Each of these communities was replicated at eight green roofs along an elevation gradient, as well as a ground level control. We found that the minimum and mean roof temperature decreased with increasing PD in the plant community. Increasing PD also led to an increase in the volume of rainwater captured, but not the proportion of water lost via evapotranspiration 48 hr following the rain event. Our findings suggest that considering these evolutionary relationships could improve functioning of green infrastructure and we recommend that understanding how to make PD (and other measures of diversity) serviceable for plant selection by practitioners will improve the effectiveness of design and ecosystem service delivery. Lastly, since no two green roof sites are the same and can vary tremendously in microclimate conditions, our study illustrates the importance of including multiple independent sites in studies of green roof performance.

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Phylogenetic ecology and the greening of cities

Cited by 33 publications

References 91 publications

Increasing species richness but decreasing phylogenetic richness and divergence over a 320‐year period of urbanization

Increasing species richness but decreasing phylogenetic richness and divergence over a 320‐year period of urbanization

The contribution of constructed green infrastructure to urban biodiversity: A synthesis and meta‐analysis

Manipulating plant phylogenetic diversity for green roof ecosystem service delivery

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