Seed-dispersal networks in tropical forest fragments: area effects, remnant species, and interaction diversity

Emer, Carine; Jordano, Pedro; Pizo, Marco Aurélio; Ribeiro, Milton Cezar; Silva, Fernanda R. da; Galetti, Mauro

doi:10.1101/701730

Cited by 15 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 74 publications

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“…Increased patch isolation, edge effects, and habitat degradation resulting from fragmentation, for instance, can negatively affects mutualisms (Magrach et al, 2014). Emer et al (2020) demonstrated in seed dispersal networks that the number of beneficial interactions decreased with increasing fragmentation. Because species interactions often affect organisms' survival and reproduction and underlie ecosystem functions, developing a predictive framework for how habitat fragmentation affects species interactions is vital for preserving biological communities within remaining habitat.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Microbiome‐mediated effects of habitat fragmentation on native plant performance

Kiesewetter

Afkhami

2021

New Phytologist

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Habitat fragmentation is a leading cause of biodiversity and ecosystem function loss in the Anthropocene. Despite the importance of plant-microbiome interactions to ecosystem productivity, we have limited knowledge of how fragmentation affects microbiomes and even less knowledge of its consequences for microbial interactions with plants.Combining field surveys, microbiome sequencing, manipulative experiments, and random forest models, we investigated fragmentation legacy effects on soil microbiomes in imperiled pine rocklands, tested how compositional shifts across 14 fragmentation-altered soil microbiomes affected performance and resource allocation of three native plant species, and identified fragmentation-responding microbial families underpinning plant performance.Legacies of habitat fragmentation were associated with significant changes in microbial diversity and composition (across three of four community axes). Experiments showed plants often strongly benefited from the microbiome's presence, but fragmentation-associated changes in microbiome composition also significantly affected plant performance and resource allocation across all seven metrics examined. Finally, random forest models identified ten fungal and six bacterial families important for plant performance that changed significantly with fragmentation.Our findings not only support the existence of significant fragmentation effects on natural microbiomes, but also demonstrate for the first time that fragmentation-associated changes in microbiomes can have meaningful consequences for native plant performance and investment.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Microbiome‐mediated effects of habitat fragmentation on native plant performance

Kiesewetter

Afkhami

2021

New Phytologist

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“…Although the study of the spatial scaling of network structure has progressed theoretically (Brose et al 2004, Pillai et al 2011, Galiana et al 2018), empirical approaches are largely missing (but see Wood et al 2015, Dáttilo et al 2019, Emer et al 2019). One exception is the work by Wood et al (2015) on the effects of sampling and spatial scale on intertidal marine food webs in Alaska.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The spatial scaling of food web structure across European biogeographical regions

et al. 2021

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The species-area relationship (SAR) is one of the most well-established scaling patterns in ecology. Its implications for understanding how communities change across spatial gradients are numerous, including the effects of habitat loss on biodiversity. However, ecological communities are not mere collections of species. They are the result of interactions between these species forming complex networks that tie them together. Should we aim to grasp the spatial scaling of biodiversity as a whole, it is fundamental to understand the changes in the structure of interaction networks with area. In spite of a few empirical and theoretical studies that address this challenge, we still do not know much about how network structure changes with area, or what are the main environmental drivers of these changes. Here, using the meta-network of potential interactions between all terrestrial vertebrates in Europe (1140 species and 67 201 feeding interactions), we analysed network-area relationships (NARs) that summarize how network properties scale with area. We do this across ten biogeographical regions, which differ in environmental characteristics. We found that the spatial scaling of network complexity strongly varied across biogeographical regions. However, once the variation in SARs was accounted for, differences in the shape of NARs vanished. On the other hand, the proportion of species across trophic levels remained remarkably constant across biogeographical regions and spatial scales, despite the great variation in species richness. Spatial variation in mean annual temperature and habitat clustering were the main environmental determinants of the shape of both SARs and NARs across Europe. Our results suggest new avenues in the exploration of the effects of environmental factors on the spatial scaling of biodiversity. We argue that NARs can provide new insights to analyse and understand ecological communities.

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“…Data available from the Dryad Digital Repository: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.gmsbcc2hv (Emer et al ).…”

Section: Data Availability Statementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seed dispersal networks in tropical forest fragments: Area effects, remnant species, and interaction diversity

et al. 2019

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Seed dispersal interactions involve key ecological processes in tropical forests that help to maintain ecosystem functioning. Yet this functionality may be threatened by increasing habitat loss, defaunation, and fragmentation. However, generalist species, and their interactions, can benefit from the habitat change caused by human disturbance while more specialized interactions mostly disappear. Therefore, changes in the structure of the local, within fragment, networks can be expected. Here we investigated how the structure of seed dispersal networks changes along a gradient of increasing habitat fragmentation. We analyzed 16 bird seed dispersal assemblages from forest fragments of a biodiversity‐rich ecosystem. We found significant species–, interaction–, and network–area relationships, yet the later was determined by the number of species remaining in each community. The number of frugivorous bird and plant species, their interactions, and the number of links per species decreases as area is lost in the fragmented landscape. In contrast, network nestedness has a negative relationship with fragment area, suggesting an increasing generalization of the network structure in the gradient of fragmentation. Network specialization was not significantly affected by area, indicating that some network properties may be invariant to disturbance. Still, the local extinction of partner species, paralleled by a loss of interactions and specialist–specialist bird–plant seed dispersal associations, suggests the functional homogenization of the system as area is lost. Our study provides empirical evidence for network–area relationships driven by the presence/absence of remnant species and the interactions they perform. Abstract in Spanish is available with online material.

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Seed-dispersal networks in tropical forest fragments: area effects, remnant species, and interaction diversity

Cited by 15 publications

References 74 publications

Microbiome‐mediated effects of habitat fragmentation on native plant performance

Microbiome‐mediated effects of habitat fragmentation on native plant performance

The spatial scaling of food web structure across European biogeographical regions

Seed dispersal networks in tropical forest fragments: Area effects, remnant species, and interaction diversity

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