Scaling Disturbance Instead of Richness to Better Understand Anthropogenic Impacts on Biodiversity

Mayor, Stephen J.; Cahill, James; He, Fangliang; Boutin, Stan

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0125579

Cited by 10 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 73 publications

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“…The structure and composition of the landscape surrounding each plot was derived from a high-resolution land-use map (scale 1:10,000), extracted from the Corine Land Cover map level III (ISPRA, 2010). Human disturbance was defined as the proportion of land area converted by humans (Mayor et al, 2015), and was categorized as agricultural (e.g. pasture and croplands, tree planting areas), and urban/ industrial (e.g.…”

Section: Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Local versus landscape-scale effects of anthropogenic land-use on forest species richness

et al. 2018

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The study investigated the effects of human-induced landscape patterns on species richness in forests. For 80 plots of fixed size, we measured human disturbance (categorized as urban/industrial and agricultural land areas), at ‘local’ and ‘landscape’ scale (500m and 2500m radius from each plot, respectively), the distance from the forest edge, and the size and shape of the woody patch. By using GLM, we analyzed the effects of disturbance\ud and patch-based measures on both total species richness and the richness of a group of specialist species (i.e. the ‘ancient forest species’), representing more specific forest features. Patterns of local species richness were sensitive to the structure and composition of the surrounding landscape. Among the landscape components taken into account, urban/industrial land areas turned out as the most threatening factor for both total species richness\ud and the richness of the ancient forest species. However, the best models evidenced a different intensity of the response to the same disturbance category as well as a different pool of significant variables for the two groups of species. The use of groups of species, such as the ancient forest species pool, that are functionally related and have similar ecological requirements, may represent an effective solution for monitoring forest dynamics under the effects of external factors. The approach of relating local assessment of species richness, and in particular of the ancient forest species pool, to land-use patterns may play an important role for the science-policy interface by supporting and strengthening conservation and regional planning decision making

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Section: Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Local versus landscape-scale effects of anthropogenic land-use on forest species richness

et al. 2018

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“…), and the effects of ecological perturbations are beginning to be investigated in an increasingly macroecological framework (Supp and Ernest , Mayor et al. ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Disturbance macroecology: a comparative study of community structure metrics in a high‐severity disturbance regime

et al. 2020

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2020.Disturbance macroecology: a comparative study of community structure metrics in a high-severity disturbance regime.Abstract. Macroecological studies have established widespread patterns of species diversity and abundance in ecosystems but have generally restricted their scope to relatively steady-state systems. As a result, how macroecological metrics are expected to scale in ecosystems that experience natural disturbance regimes is unknown. We examine macroecological patterns in a fire-dependent forest of Bishop pine (Pinus muricata). We target two different-aged stands in a stand-replacing fire regime: a mature stand with a diverse understory and with no history of major disturbance for at least 40 yr, and one disturbed by a stand-replacing fire 17 yr prior to measurement. We compare properties of these stands with macroecological predictions from the Maximum Entropy Theory of Ecology (METE), an information entropy-based theory that has proven highly successful in predicting macroecological metrics in multiple ecosystems and taxa. Ecological patterns in the mature stand more closely match METE predictions than do data from the more recently disturbed, mid-seral stage stand. This suggests METE's predictions are more robust in latesuccessional, slowly changing, or steady-state systems than those in rapid flux with respect to species composition, abundances, and organisms' sizes. Our findings highlight the need for a macroecological theory that incorporates natural disturbance, perturbations, and ecological dynamics into its predictive capabilities, because most natural systems are not in a steady state.

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“…(). The compensation phenomena suggested at the local scale might play the same role at the regional scale since the effect of perturbations on species richness shows no spatial scale dependence (Mayor, Cahill, He, & Boutin, ). However, the effects of past perturbations including fragmentation on current plant richness have not been considered (Lindborg & Eriksson, ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Drivers of plant richness patterns of Mediterranean riparian forests at local and regional scales have bottom‐up and top‐down effects

Leo

Calleja

Lara

et al. 2019

J Vegetation Science

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Questions: It has been long recognized that community species richness depends on factors operating at different spatial scales. Most frequently, across-scale studies have focused on the impact of regional factors on local richness (top-down effects) while few have analyzed the importance of local factors on regional richness (bottom-up) and even fewer have tried to integrate effects on both directions. Our objectives were to reveal the key factors shaping plant species richness of Mediterranean riparian forests and to test whether empirical models based on top-down or bottomup relationships are able to explain the spatial scaling of richness.Location: Southern half of Spain, SW Europe. Methods:We designed two structural equation models integrating relationships between biotic and abiotic variables at two spatial scales, local and regional. Our models incorporated observed richness of 689 riparian woody communities.Results: Local-scale richness depended mostly on local climate, lithology and sediment textures. Regional species richness was driven by climate, lithology and water regime. In the top-down model, regional to local effects were driven mostly by the influence of regional richness on local richness. However, we also detected several bottom-up effects linking local climate, abiotic habitat and vegetation structure with the regional richness. In the bottom-up model, results were very similar, adding an effect of regional climate on local richness.Conclusions: Local, regional and across-scales factors are crucial for understanding species richness of Mediterranean riparian forests. Some factors are inherent to riparian habitats whereas others are already known as relevant for upland habitats. We provide support for the top-down models relying on the concepts of species pool and environmental filtering. However, we also stress that local-scale processes influence regional species richness. Bottom-up effects should not be underestimated when studying the spatial scaling of biodiversity. K E Y W O R D Scommunity, diversity, modeling, riverbank, scales, SEM, southwestern Europe, species pool 486 |

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Scaling Disturbance Instead of Richness to Better Understand Anthropogenic Impacts on Biodiversity

Cited by 10 publications

References 73 publications

Local versus landscape-scale effects of anthropogenic land-use on forest species richness

Local versus landscape-scale effects of anthropogenic land-use on forest species richness

Disturbance macroecology: a comparative study of community structure metrics in a high‐severity disturbance regime

Drivers of plant richness patterns of Mediterranean riparian forests at local and regional scales have bottom‐up and top‐down effects

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