Dataset Information

Landscape simplification filters species traits and drives biotic homogenization.

ABSTRACT: Biodiversity loss can affect the viability of ecosystems by decreasing the ability of communities to respond to environmental change and disturbances. Agricultural intensification is a major driver of biodiversity loss and has multiple components operating at different spatial scales: from in-field management intensity to landscape-scale simplification. Here we show that landscape-level effects dominate functional community composition and can even buffer the effects of in-field management intensification on functional homogenization, and that animal communities in real-world managed landscapes show a unified response (across orders and guilds) to both landscape-scale simplification and in-field intensification. Adults and larvae with specialized feeding habits, species with shorter activity periods and relatively small body sizes are selected against in simplified landscapes with intense in-field management. Our results demonstrate that the diversity of land cover types at the landscape scale is critical for maintaining communities, which are functionally diverse, even in landscapes where in-field management intensity is high.

SUBMITTER: Gamez-Virues S

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4634213 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Landscape simplification filters species traits and drives biotic homogenization.

Gámez-Virués Sagrario S Perović David J DJ Gossner Martin M MM Börschig Carmen C Blüthgen Nico N de Jong Heike H Simons Nadja K NK Klein Alexandra-Maria AM Krauss Jochen J Maier Gwen G Scherber Christoph C Steckel Juliane J Rothenwöhrer Christoph C Steffan-Dewenter Ingolf I Weiner Christiane N CN Weisser Wolfgang W Werner Michael M Tscharntke Teja T Westphal Catrin C

Nature communications 20151020

Biodiversity loss can affect the viability of ecosystems by decreasing the ability of communities to respond to environmental change and disturbances. Agricultural intensification is a major driver of biodiversity loss and has multiple components operating at different spatial scales: from in-field management intensity to landscape-scale simplification. Here we show that landscape-level effects dominate functional community composition and can even buffer the effects of in-field management inten ...[more]

PMID: 26485325

Similar Datasets

Project description:Environmental change has reshuffled communities often causing taxonomic homogenization rather than differentiation. Some studies suggest that this increasing similarity of species composition between communities is accompanied by an increase in similarity of trait composition-functional homogenization-although different methodologies have failed to come to any consistent conclusions. Functional homogenization could have a large effect on ecosystem functioning and stability. Here, we use the general definition of homogenization as "reduced spatial turnover over time" to compare changes in Simpson's beta diversity (taxonomic turnover) with changes in Rao's quadratic entropy beta diversity (functional turnover) in British breeding birds at three spatial scales. Using biotic and climatic variables, we identify which factors may predispose a site to homogenization. The change in turnover measures between two time periods, 20 years apart, was calculated. A null model approach was taken to identify occurrences of functional homogenization and differentiation independent of changes in taxonomic turnover. We used conditional autoregressive models fitted using integrated nested Laplace approximations to determine how environmental drivers and factors relating to species distributions affect changes in spatial turnover of species and functional diversity. The measurement of functional homogenization affects the chance of rejection of the null models, with many sites showing taxonomic homogenization unaccompanied by functional homogenization, although occurrence varies with spatial scale. At the smallest scale, while temperature-related variables drive changes in taxonomic turnover, changes in functional turnover are associated with variation in growing degree days; however, changes in functional turnover become more difficult to predict at larger spatial scales. Our results highlight the multifactorial processes underlying taxonomic and functional homogenization and that redundancy in species traits may allow ecosystem functioning to be maintained in some areas despite changes in species composition.

Project description:Urbanization is a major contributor to biodiversity declines. However, studies assessing effects of urban landscapes per se (i.e., disentangled from focal habitat effects) on biodiversity across spatial scales are lacking. Understanding such scale-dependent effects is fundamental to preserve habitats along an urbanization gradient in a way that maximizes overall biodiversity. We investigated the impact of landscape urbanization on communities of woodland-breeding bird species in individual (local scale) and across multiple (regional scale) cities, while controlling for the quality of sampled habitats (woodlands). We conducted bird point counts and habitat quality mapping of trees, dead wood, and shrubs in 459 woodlands along an urban to rural urbanization gradient in 32 cities in Sweden. Responses to urbanization were measured as local and regional total diversity (γ), average site diversity (α), and diversity between sites (β). We also assessed effects on individual species and to what extent dissimilarities in species composition along the urbanization gradient were driven by species nestedness or turnover. We found that landscape urbanization had a negative impact on γ-, α-, and β-diversity irrespective of spatial scale, both regarding all woodland-breeding species and red-listed species. At the regional scale, dissimilarities in species composition between urbanization levels were due to nestedness, that is, species were lost with increased landscape urbanization without being replaced. In contrast, dissimilarities at the local scale were mostly due to species turnover. Because there was no difference in habitat quality among woodlands across the urbanization gradient, we conclude that landscape urbanization as such systematically causes poorer and more homogeneous bird communities in adjacent natural habitats. However, the high local turnover and the fact that several species benefited from urbanization demonstrates that natural habitats along the entire urbanization gradient are needed to maintain maximally diverse local bird communities.

Dataset Information

Landscape simplification filters species traits and drives biotic homogenization.

Publications

Landscape simplification filters species traits and drives biotic homogenization.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets