Dataset Information

Molecular diagnosis of bird-mediated pest consumption in tropical farmland.

ABSTRACT: Biodiversity loss will likely have surprising and dramatic consequences for human wellbeing. Identifying species that benefit society represents a critical first step towards predicting the consequences of biodiversity loss. Though natural predators prevent billions of dollars in agricultural pest damage annually, characterizing which predators consume pests has proven challenging. Emerging molecular techniques may illuminate these interactions. In the countryside of Costa Rica, we identified avian predators of coffee's most damaging insect pest, the coffee berry borer beetle (Coleoptera:Scolytidae Hypothenemus hampeii), by assaying 1430 fecal samples of 108 bird species for borer DNA. While feeding trials confirmed the efficacy of our approach, detection rates were low. Nevertheless, we identified six species that consume the borer. These species had narrow diet breadths, thin bills, and short wings; traits shared with borer predators in other systems. Borer predators were not threatened; therefore, safeguarding pest control necessitates managing species beyond those at risk of regional extinction by maintaining populations in farmland habitats. Generally, our results demonstrate potential for pairing molecular methods with ecological analyses to yield novel insights into species interactions.

SUBMITTER: Karp DS

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4216319 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Molecular diagnosis of bird-mediated pest consumption in tropical farmland.

Karp Daniel S DS Judson Seth S Daily Gretchen C GC Hadly Elizabeth A EA

SpringerPlus 20141024

Biodiversity loss will likely have surprising and dramatic consequences for human wellbeing. Identifying species that benefit society represents a critical first step towards predicting the consequences of biodiversity loss. Though natural predators prevent billions of dollars in agricultural pest damage annually, characterizing which predators consume pests has proven challenging. Emerging molecular techniques may illuminate these interactions. In the countryside of Costa Rica, we identified av ...[more]

PMID: 25392800

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Project description:Widespread farmland abandonment has led to significant landscape transformations of many European mountain areas. These semi-natural multi-habitat landscapes are important reservoirs of biodiversity and their abandonment has important conservation implications. In multi-habitat landscapes the adaptation of communities depends on the differential affinity of the species to the available habitats. We use nested species-area relationships (SAR) to model species richness patterns of bird communities across scales in a mountain landscape, in NW Portugal. We compare the performance of the classic-SAR and the countryside-SAR (i.e. multi-habitat) models at the landscape scale, and compare species similarity decay (SSD) at the regional scale. We find a considerable overlap of bird communities in the different land-uses (farmland, shrubland and oak forest) at the landscape scale. Analysis of the classic and countryside SAR show that specialist species are strongly related to their favourite habitat. Farmland and shrubland have higher regional SSD compared to oak forests. However, this is due to the opportunistic use of farmlands by generalist birds. Forest specialists display significant regional turnover in oak forest. Overall, the countryside-SAR model had a better fit to the data showing that habitat composition determines species richness across scales. Finally, we use the countryside-SAR model to forecast bird diversity under four scenarios of land-use change. Farmland abandonment scenarios show little impact on bird diversity as the model predicts that the complete loss of farmland is less dramatic, in terms of species diversity loss, than the disappearance of native Galicio-Portuguese oak forest. The affinities of species to non-preferred habitats suggest that bird communities can adapt to land-use changes derived from farmland abandonment. Based on model predictions we argue that rewilding may be a suitable management option for many European mountain areas.

Project description:AimAlthough patterns of biodiversity across the globe are well studied, there is still a controversial debate about the underlying mechanisms and their generality across biogeographic scales. In particular, it is unclear to what extent diversity patterns along environmental gradients are directly driven by abiotic factors, such as climate, or indirectly mediated through biotic factors, such as resource effects on consumers.LocationAndes, Southern Ecuador; Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.MethodsWe studied the diversity of fleshy-fruited plants and avian frugivores at the taxonomic level, that is, species richness and abundance, as well as at the level of functional traits, that is, functional richness and functional dispersion. We compared two important biodiversity hotspots in mountain systems of the Neotropics and Afrotropics. We used field data of plant and bird communities, including trait measurements of 367 plant and bird species. Using structural equation modeling, we disentangled direct and indirect effects of climate and the diversity of plant communities on the diversity of bird communities.ResultsWe found significant bottom-up effects of fruit diversity on frugivore diversity at the taxonomic level. In contrast, climate was more important for patterns of functional diversity, with plant communities being mostly related to precipitation, and bird communities being most strongly related to temperature.Main conclusionsOur results illustrate the general importance of bottom-up mechanisms for the taxonomic diversity of consumers, suggesting the importance of active resource tracking. Our results also suggest that it might be difficult to identify signals of ecological fitting between functional plant and animal traits across biogeographic regions, since different species groups may respond to different climatic drivers. This decoupling between resource and consumer communities could increase under future climate change if plant and animal communities are consistently related to distinct climatic drivers.

Dataset Information

Molecular diagnosis of bird-mediated pest consumption in tropical farmland.

Publications

Molecular diagnosis of bird-mediated pest consumption in tropical farmland.

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