What is the form of the productivity–animal‐species‐richness relationship? A critical review and meta‐analysis

Abstract

The nature of the relationship between productivity and species richness has remained controversial for at least two decades. Recently authors have favored the suggestion that the form of this relationship is highly variable and scale dependent. However, this conclusion is not universally accepted. Here we present the results of a meta-analysis of animal productivity-species-richness relationships (PSRR) in terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems. Initially, 374 separate cases from 273 published studies were identified as potential tests of the animal PSRR. After critically assessing each study, 115 cases were accepted as robust tests of the relationship, and of these 95 had data available for formal meta-analysis. Contrary to expectation, we found no support for the form of the relationship being scale dependent; positive relationships predominated at all scales (geographical extents and grains). Furthermore, positive relationships were the most common form of the animal PSRR in both terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems and among vertebrates, invertebrates, homeotherms and poikilotherms. Therefore, our results also contrast with previous reviews that suggest no particular form of the PSRR is predominant. We demonstrate that the method used for classifying the form of PSRRs is critical to the result and that previous reviews may have been too liberal toward classifying the form of relationships as unimodal. The tendency for positive relationships between productivity and species richness across diverse animal taxa has important implications for understanding the mechanisms behind the latitudinal gradient in species richness.

Comparative analysis of the spatio-temporal dynamics of rotifer community structure based on taxonomic indices and functional groups in two subtropical lakes

“…In Lake Jinghu, the TP was between 0.02 and 0.11 mg.L −1 , and indices of species diversity showed a positive correlation with phosphorus concentration (TP and/or PO 4 3− ). The ecological effects of phosphorus on rotifer zooplankton species diversity are still debatable, and have been focused on identifying a positive (productivity increases diversity) or unimodal relationship between the two (low diversity at the lower and upper extremes of productivity) 50–53 . Our findings were in agreement with the established result that zooplankton diversity in reservoirs is positively correlated with TP and that productive environments (natural lakes) gather more species 54 .…”

Human Appropriation of Net Primary Production: Patterns, Trends, and Planetary Boundaries

“…A meta-analysis of empirical studies of the productivity-species richness relation published in 1999 suggested that monotonous and unimodal relationships were about equally frequent (116). However, a 2012 meta-analysis (117) concluded that earlier studies had misclassified many case studies as unimodal and suggested that if correct attribution methods were used and only robust studies were included, monotonous productivity-species richness relationships prevail at all scales.…”

A test of the Resource's and Bergmann's rules in a widely distributed small carnivore from southern South America, Conepatus chinga (Molina, 1782) (Carnivora: Mephitidae)

“…Vegetation indices are often used as a surrogate for plant productivity (Cusens et al, 2012), and EVI was developed to optimize the vegetation signal with improved sensitivity in high biomass areas (Huete et al, 2002). I downloaded EVI from http://daac.ornl.gov, at a spatial resolution of 250 m, and calculated its mean value between years 2000 and 2013.…”