Spatial scale mediates the influence of habitat fragmentation on dispersal success: Implications for conservation

Doak, Daniel F.; Marino, Paul C.; Kareiva, Peter

doi:10.1016/0040-5809(92)90032-o

Cited by 200 publications

(135 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…Habitat fragmentation may not necessarily have strong effects on community structure if the scale of the patchcorridor system relates to the size and mobility of the organisms [69]. Here, the dimensions of the alternative habitat patches, and the distance between those patches, matched those observed in natural systems (S. M. Lawrie 1996, unpublished PhD thesis), but we did not detect reduced levels of infaunal movement with decreasing corridor width in addition to the effects of differential habitat quality.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 53%

Habitat structure mediates biodiversity effects on ecosystem properties

2011

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Much of what we know about the role of biodiversity in mediating ecosystem processes and function stems from manipulative experiments, which have largely been performed in isolated, homogeneous environments that do not incorporate habitat structure or allow natural community dynamics to develop. Here, we use a range of habitat configurations in a model marine benthic system to investigate the effects of species composition, resource heterogeneity and patch connectivity on ecosystem properties at both the patch (bioturbation intensity) and multi-patch (nutrient concentration) scale. We show that allowing fauna to move and preferentially select patches alters local species composition and density distributions, which has negative effects on ecosystem processes (bioturbation intensity) at the patch scale, but overall positive effects on ecosystem functioning (nutrient concentration) at the multi-patch scale. Our findings provide important evidence that community dynamics alter in response to localized resource heterogeneity and that these small-scale variations in habitat structure influence species contributions to ecosystem properties at larger scales. We conclude that habitat complexity forms an important buffer against disturbance and that contemporary estimates of the level of biodiversity required for maintaining future multi-functional systems may need to be revised.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 53%

Habitat structure mediates biodiversity effects on ecosystem properties

2011

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“…Colonization among habitat patches is more likely to occur between adjacent patches (Harrison, 1991;Doebeli and Ruxton, 1998;Thomas et al, 2001;Wiens, 2001) and in systems with more connectivity (Fahrig and Merriam, 1985;Hansson, 1991;Moilanen and Hanski, 2001). Thus, spatial configuration would affect the ability of a species to disperse and, in systems with habitat dynamics, the distance between suitable unoccupied and occupied patches (Doak et al, 1992;Diffendorfer et al, 1999). We expect that the spatial configuration of patches in a metapopulation-determined by the shape of the patch network (elongated or compact, for example) rather than the distance between neighboring patches-may affect not only colonization (Hanski and Ovaskainen, 2000) but also how much of the time a patch contains suitable habitat (Cochrane, 2003), by modifying the frequency at which patches are disturbed or colonized.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How patch configuration affects the impact of disturbances on metapopulation persistence

Vuilleumier

Wilcox

Cairns

et al. 2007

Theoretical Population Biology

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Disturbances affect metapopulations directly through reductions in population size and indirectly through habitat modification. We consider how metapopulation persistence is affected by different disturbance regimes and the way in which disturbances spread, when metapopulations are compact or elongated, using a stochastic spatially explicit model which includes metapopulation and habitat dynamics. We discover that the risk of population extinction is larger for spatially aggregated disturbances than for spatially random disturbances. By changing the spatial configuration of the patches in the system-leading to different proportions of edge and interior patches-we demonstrate that the probability of metapopulation extinction is smaller when the metapopulation is more compact. Both of these results become more pronounced when colonization connectivity decreases. Our results have important management implication as edge patches, which are invariably considered to be less important, may play an important role as disturbance refugia. r

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“…Two basic groups of definitions can be distinguished: structural connectivity where connectivity is based entirely on landscape structure (e.g., Green 1994;Metzger and Décamps 1997;Tiebout and Anderson 1997;Girvetz and Greco 2007), with no direct link to any behavioral attributes of organisms (Green 1994;Metzger and Décamps 1997;Collinge and Forman 1998;Collinge 2000), and functional connectivity which considers organisms' behavioral responses to individual landscape elements (patches and edges) and the spatial configuration of the entire landscape (Doak et al 1992;Demers et al 1995;Gustafson and Gardner 1996;Schumaker 1996;Ruckelshaus et al 1997;Pither and Taylor 1998;Tischendorf and Fahrig 2000b;Sweeney et al 2007). Consequently, functional connectivity covers situations where organisms venture into non-habitat (matrix), where they may (1) face higher mortality risks (e.g., Gaines and McGlenaghan 1980;Henein and Merriam 1990;Poole 1997;Sakai and Noon 1997), (2) express different movement patterns (e.g., Baars 1979;Wallin and Ekbom 1988;Wegner and Merriam 1990;Hansson 1991;Johnson et al 1992a;Andreassen et al 1996b;FitzGibbon et al 2007), and (3) cross boundaries (e.g., Mader 1984;Wiens et al 1985;Duelli et al 1990;Mader et al 1990;Mauremooto et al 1995;Sakai and Noon 1997;Walker et al 2007).…”

Section: From Intuitive Definitions To Basic Categorizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Connectivity measures: a review

2008

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One of the central problems in contemporary ecology and conservation biology is the drastic change of landscapes induced by anthropogenic activities, resulting in habitat loss and fragmentation. For many wild living species, local extinctions of fragmented populations are common and recolonization is critical for regional survival. Successful recolonization depends on the availability of dispersing individuals and the degree of landscape connectivity. The obvious implications of landscape connectivity for conservation biology have led to a proliferation of connectivity measures. However, general relationships between landscape connectivity and landscape structure are lacking, and so are the relationships between different connectivity metrics. Consequently, there is a need to develop landscape metrics that more accurately characterize the landscape with an emphasis on the underlying processes. Here we review various definitions of landscape connectivity, explain their mathematical connotations, and make some unifying conclusions and suggestions for future research.

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Spatial scale mediates the influence of habitat fragmentation on dispersal success: Implications for conservation

Cited by 200 publications

References 25 publications

Habitat structure mediates biodiversity effects on ecosystem properties

Habitat structure mediates biodiversity effects on ecosystem properties

How patch configuration affects the impact of disturbances on metapopulation persistence

Connectivity measures: a review

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