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Changes in bird functional diversity across multiple land uses: interpretations of functional redundancy depend on functional group identity.

ABSTRACT: Examinations of the impact of land-use change on functional diversity link changes in ecological community structure driven by land modification with the consequences for ecosystem function. Yet, most studies have been small-scale, experimental analyses and primarily focussed on plants. There is a lack of research on fauna communities and at large-scales across multiple land uses. We assessed changes in the functional diversity of bird communities across 24 land uses aligned along an intensification gradient. We tested the hypothesis that functional diversity is higher in less intensively used landscapes, documented changes in diversity using four diversity metrics, and examined how functional diversity varied with species richness to identify levels of functional redundancy. Functional diversity, measured using a dendogram-based metric, increased from high to low intensity land uses, but observed values did not differ significantly from randomly-generated expected values. Values for functional evenness and functional divergence did not vary consistently with land-use intensification, although higher than expected values were mostly recorded in high intensity land uses. A total of 16 land uses had lower than expected values for functional dispersion and these were mostly low intensity native vegetation sites. Relations between functional diversity and bird species richness yielded strikingly different patterns for the entire bird community vs. particular functional groups. For all birds and insectivores, functional evenness, divergence and dispersion showed a linear decline with increasing species richness suggesting substantial functional redundancy across communities. However, for nectarivores, frugivores and carnivores, there was a significant hump-shaped or non-significant positive linear relationship between these functional measures and species richness indicating less redundancy. Hump-shaped relationships signify that the most functionally diverse communities occur at intermediate levels of species richness. Interpretations of redundancy thus vary for different functional groups and related ecosystem functions (e.g. pollination), and can be substantially different to relationships involving entire ecological communities.

SUBMITTER: Luck GW

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3656964 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:Riparian ecosystems are suffering anthropogenic threats that reduce biodiversity and undermine ecosystem services. However, there is a great deal of uncertainty about the way species composition of assemblages is related to ecosystem function, especially in a landscape fragmentation context.Here, we assess the impact of habitat loss and disturbance on Functional Diversity (FD) components Functional Redundancy (FRed), Functional Evenness (FEve), and Functional Richness (FRic) of riparian forest bird assemblages to evaluate (a) how FD components respond to riparian forest width reduction and vegetation disturbance; (b) the existence of thresholds within these relationships; (c) which of the main birds diet guild (frugivores, insectivores, and omnivores) respond to such thresholds. We predict that FD components will be affected negatively and nonlinearly by riparian changes. However, guilds could have different responses due to differences of species sensitivity to fragmentation and disturbance. We expect to find thresholds in FD responses, because fragmentation and disturbance drive loss of specific FD components.Our results show that FRed and FEve were linearly affected by width and disturbance of riparian habitats, respectively. FRed was significantly lower in riparian forests assemblages below 400 m wide, and FEve was significantly higher above 60% disturbance. These responses of FD were also followed to the decline in insectivores and frugivores richness in riparian forests most affected by these changes.Consequently, our study suggests communities do not tolerate reduction in riparian forest width or disturbance intensification without negative impact on FD, and this becomes more critical for riparian area <400-m wide or with more than 60% disturbance. This minimum riparian width required to maintain FRed is greater than the minimum width required for riparian forests by Brazilian law. Thus, it is important to consider mechanisms to expand riparian habitats and reduce the disturbance intensity in riparian forests so that riparian bird community FD may be effectively conserved.

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Changes in bird functional diversity across multiple land uses: interpretations of functional redundancy depend on functional group identity.

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