Structure and Stability of Ecological Networks : The role of dynamic dimensionality and species variability in resource use

Gilljam, David

doi:10.3384/diss.diva-123970

Cited by 2 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 153 publications

(185 reference statements)

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“…A growing body of theoretical work (Barbour et al 2016, Gilljam 2016, Zee and Schreiber 2017 documents the changes that this intraspecific variation can make to ecological networks, but empirical data on the topic are still relatively poor (Woodward et al 2010, Gilljam et al 2011. In particular, there has been little work identifying the structural network consequences of intraspecific variation that arises as a result of organisms moving through their life cycle, life stage variation, despite its prevalence in nature (Preston et al 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The impact of intraspecific variation on food web structure

Clegg

Ali

Beckerman

2018

Ecology

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Accounting for the variation that occurs within species in food webs can theoretically result in significant changes in both network structure and dynamics. However, there has been little work exploring their role with empirical data. In particular, the variation associated with species’ life cycles, which is prevalent and represents both trait variation and taxonomic identity, has received little attention. Here, we characterize the structural consequences of life stage variation in five food webs, including a newly compiled web from the Arabian Gulf. We show that making life stage variation explicit in food webs results in larger food webs that possess consistent structural changes that are separate from the changes in structure that come simply from increasing the number of nodes in the webs. Furthermore, we show that the magnitude of these changes is related to ontogenetic specialism, the degree of overlap in the ecological niches of life stages. These results demonstrate the capacity of intraspecific variation to affect ecological networks and indicate the potential usefulness of stage‐structured food webs, which capture size and taxonomic information, to represent variation below the species level.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A growing body of theoretical work (Barbour et al. , Gilljam , Zee and Schreiber ) documents the changes that this intraspecific variation can make to ecological networks, but empirical data on the topic are still relatively poor (Woodward et al. , Gilljam et al.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The impact of intraspecific variation on food web structure

Clegg

Ali

Beckerman

2018

Ecology

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“…Human-directed sociability is an important trait in our dogs, and during evolution alongside humans, dogs seem to have acquired an interspecific social competence. Their abilities to communicate, to cooperate, and to form strong social attachments to humans are examples of this (43).…”

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confidence: 99%

Dog behaviour : Intricate picture of genetics, epigenetics, and human-dog relations

Sundman

2019

Linköping Studies in Science and Technology. Dissertations

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Dogs, Canis familiaris, share the lives of humans all over the world. That dogs, and the behaviour of dogs, are of interest to many is therefore no surprise. In this thesis, the main aim has been to identify factors that affect dogs' behaviours. The dog, Canis familiaris, is our first domesticated animal. Since domestication, various types of dogs have developed through adaptation to an environment shared with humans and through our selective breeding, resulting in a unique variation in morphology and behaviour. Although there is an individual variation in the behaviour of dogs, there is also a difference between breeds. Moreover, selection during the last decades has split some breeds into divergent types. Labrador and golden retrievers are divided into a common type, for show and companionship, and a field type, for hunting. By comparing the breed types, we can study the effects of recent selection. In Paper I, we investigate differences in general behavioural traits between Labrador and golden retriever and between common and field type within the two breeds by using results from the standardized behaviour test Dog Mentality Assessment. There were differences between breeds and types for all behavioural traits. However, there was also an interaction between breed and type. Thus, a common/field-type Labrador does not behave like a common/field-type golden retriever. Even though they have been selected for similar traits, the selection has affected the general behavioural traits differently in the two breeds. In paper II, we were interested in dogs' human-directed social skills. Dogs have a high social competence when it comes to humans. Two experiments commonly used to study these skills are the problem-solving test, where dogs' human-directed behaviours when faced with a problem are measured, and the pointing test, where dogs are tested on how well they understand human gestures. We compared the social skills of German shepherds and Labrador retrievers, and of common-and field-type Labradors. Labradors were more successful in the pointing test and German shepherds stayed closer to their owners during the problem solving. Among Labrador types, the field type had more human eye contact than the common type. Importantly, when comparing the two experiments, we found no positive correlations between the problem-solving test and the pointing test, suggesting that the two tests measure different aspects of human-directed social behaviour in dogs. A previous study has identified two suggestive genetic regions for human-directed social behaviours during the problem-solving test in beagles. In paper III, we show that these SNPs are also associated to social behaviours in Labrador and golden retrievers. Moreover, the Labrador breed types differed significantly in allele frequencies. This indicates that the two SNPs have been affected by recent selection and may have a part in the differences in sociability between common and field type. The behaviour of dogs cannot simply be explained by genetics, there is also an enviro...

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Structure and Stability of Ecological Networks : The role of dynamic dimensionality and species variability in resource use

Cited by 2 publications

References 153 publications

The impact of intraspecific variation on food web structure

The impact of intraspecific variation on food web structure

Dog behaviour : Intricate picture of genetics, epigenetics, and human-dog relations

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