Ecological networks are more sensitive to plant than to animal extinction under climate change

Schleuning, Matthias; Fründ, Jochen; Schweiger, Oliver; Welk, Erik; Albrecht, Jörg; Albrecht, Matthias; Beil, Marion; Benadi, Gita; Blüthgen, Nico; Bruelheide, Helge; Böhning‐Gaese, Katrin; Dehling, D. Matthias; Dormann, Carsten F.; Exeler, Nina; Farwig, Nina; Alexander, Heather D.; Hickler, Thomas; Kratochwil, Anselm; Kuhlmann, Michael; Kühn, Ingolf; Michez, Denis; Mudri‐Stojnić, Sonja; Plein, Michaela; Rasmont, Pierre; Schwabe, Angelika; Settele, Josef; Vujić, Ante; Weiner, Christiane N.; Wiemers, Martin; Hof, Christian

doi:10.1038/ncomms13965

Cited by 211 publications

(246 citation statements)

References 55 publications

(98 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

225

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The dominant grass species at KPBS, Andropogon gerardii , decreases in biomass at soil temperatures >25°C (DeLucia, Heckathorn, & Day, ). Based on previously reported plant community responses (Harrison, Gornish, & Copeland, ) and our results, increasing temperatures decrease plant species richness in this system, making grasshopper communities more susceptible to additional plant loss (Schleuning et al, ) and decreasing grasshopper diversity (Lenhart et al, ). High temperatures may also directly reduce grasshopper populations if species pass thermal limits; a previous temperature manipulation study on KPBS showed grasshopper survival in the absence of predators was highest in the lowest temperature treatment (Laws & Joern, ).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Fire, grazing and climate shape plant–grasshopper interactions in a tallgrass prairie

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Species interactions are integral to ecological community function, and the structure of species interactions has repercussions for the consequences of species extinctions. Few studies have examined the role of environmental factors in controlling species interaction networks across time. We examined variation in plant–grasshopper network structural properties in response to three major grassland drivers: periodic fire, ungulate grazing and climate. We sequenced a plant barcoding gene from extracted grasshopper gut contents to characterize diets of 26 grasshopper species. Resulting grasshopper species’ diets were combined with long‐term plant and grasshopper surveys to assemble plant–grasshopper networks across 13–19 years for six watersheds subjected to varying fire and grazing treatments. Network modularity, generality and predicted grasshopper community robustness to plant species loss all increased in grazed watersheds. Temperature decreased predicted grasshopper community robustness to plant species loss. Grasshopper communities were found to be vulnerable to climatic warming due to host plant loss. However, intermediate disturbance from ungulate grazers may maintain grasshopper diversity and buffer community robustness to species loss. Our results suggest that climate and disturbance shape the structure of ecological interaction networks and thus have many indirect effects on species persistence though direct effects on interaction partners. A plain language summary is available for this article.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Fire, grazing and climate shape plant–grasshopper interactions in a tallgrass prairie

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The positive association between resource and consumer diversity underpins the relevance of bottom-up effects in ecological communities. One important implication of this finding is that the loss of plant diversity, e.g., due to forest conversion, selective logging or climate change, could have cascading effects on the associated animal communities (Brodie et al, 2014;Schleuning et al, 2016). In contrast to the bottomup effects of plants on animals, the PD and functional identity of bird dispersers were unrelated to the PD and functional identity of seedlings.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 52%

Phylogenetic and Functional Diversity of Fleshy-Fruited Plants Are Positively Associated with Seedling Diversity in a Tropical Montane Forest

et al. 2017

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Mutualistic interactions between plants and animals can affect both plant and animal communities, and potentially leave imprints on plant demography. Yet, no study has simultaneously tested how trait variation in plant resources shapes the diversity of animal consumers, and how these interactions influence seedling recruitment. Here, we analyzed whether (i) phylogenetic diversity and functional diversity of fruiting plants were correlated with the corresponding diversity of frugivorous birds, and (ii) whether phylogenetic diversity and functional identity of plant and bird communities influenced the corresponding diversity and identity of seedling communities. We recorded mutualistic interactions between fleshy-fruited plants and frugivorous birds and seedling communities in 10 plots along an elevational gradient in the Colombian Andes. We built a phylogeny for plants/seedlings and birds and measured relevant morphological plant and bird traits that influence plant-bird interactions and seedling recruitment. We found that phylogenetic diversity and functional diversity of frugivorous birds were positively associated with the corresponding diversities of fruiting plants, consistent with a bottom-up effect of plants on birds. Moreover, the phylogenetic diversity of seedlings was related to the phylogenetic diversity of plants, but was unrelated to the phylogenetic diversity of frugivorous birds, suggesting that top-down effects of animals on seedlings were weak. Mean seed mass of seedling communities was positively associated with the mean fruit mass of plants, but was not associated with the mean avian body mass in the frugivore communities. Our study shows that variation in the traits of fleshyfruited plants was associated with the diversity of frugivorous birds and affected the future trajectory of seedling recruitment, whereas the morphological traits of animal seed dispersers were unrelated to the phylogenetic and functional structure of seedling communities. These findings suggest that bottom-up effects are more important than top-down effects for seed-dispersal interactions and seedling recruitment in diverse tropical communities.

show abstract

“…nitrophilous plants, Chapin 1980), or if some parts of the plants (e.g. global domino effect; Schleuning et al 2016, Pöyry et al 2017). For instance, why are declines at coarse scales more accentuated for bees that were specialized on nitrophilous plants (Fig.…”

Section: Effect Of Resource Preferences On Historical Patterns Of Biomentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil eutrophication shaped the composition of pollinator assemblages during the past century

et al. 2019

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Atmospheric nitrogen deposition and other sources of environmental eutrophication have increased substantially over the past century worldwide, notwithstanding the recent declining trends in Europe. Despite the recognized susceptibility of plants to eutrophication, few studies evaluated how impacts propagate to consumers, such as pollinators. Here we aim to test if soil eutrophication contributes to the temporal dynamics of pollinators and their larval resources.We used a temporally and spatially explicit historical dataset with information on species occurrences to test if soil eutrophication, and more specifically nitrogen deposition, contributes to the patterns of change of plant and pollinator richness in the Netherlands over an 80 yr period. We focus on bees and butterflies, two groups for which we have good knowledge of larval resources that allowed us to define groups of species with different nitrogen related diet preferences. For each group we estimated richness changes between different 20-yr periods at local, regional and national scale, using analytical methods developed for analyzing richness changes based on collection data.Our findings suggest that the impacts of soil eutrophication on plant communities propagate to higher trophic levels, but with a time-lag. Pollinators with nitrogenrelated diet preferences were particularly affected, in turn potentially impairing the performance of pollinator-dependent plants. Pollinator declines continued even after their focal plants started to recover. In addition, our results suggest that current levels Research 210 of nitrogen deposition still have a negative impact on most groups here analyzed, constraining richness recoveries and accentuating declines.Our results indicate that the global increase in nitrogen availability plays an important role in the ongoing pollinator decline. Consequently, species tolerances to soil nitrogen levels should be considered across all trophic levels in management plans that aim to halt biodiversity loss and enhance ecosystems services worldwide.

show abstract

Ecological networks are more sensitive to plant than to animal extinction under climate change

Cited by 211 publications

References 55 publications

Fire, grazing and climate shape plant–grasshopper interactions in a tallgrass prairie

Fire, grazing and climate shape plant–grasshopper interactions in a tallgrass prairie

Phylogenetic and Functional Diversity of Fleshy-Fruited Plants Are Positively Associated with Seedling Diversity in a Tropical Montane Forest

Soil eutrophication shaped the composition of pollinator assemblages during the past century

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About