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Water-seeking behavior among terrestrial arthropods and mollusks in a cool mesic region: Spatial and temporal patterns

ABSTRACT: Dehydration can have negative effects on animal physiological performance, growth, reproduction, and survival, and most animals seek to minimize these effects by reducing water losses or seeking water sources. Much—but not all—of the research on animal water balance comes from dryland ecosystems. However, animals inhabiting mesic regions may also experience desiccating conditions, for example within urban heat islands or during heatwaves and droughts. Here we examined how spatial variation in impervious surface and spatial and temporal variation in microclimate impact water demand behavior of terrestrial arthropods and mollusks in three areas of mesic Northwest Ohio, with analysis of taxa that exhibited the greatest water demand behavior. Water demand behavior was measured as the frequency that individuals were observed at an artificial water source (a moistened pouch), relative to the frequency at a control (a dry pouch). Overall, terrestrial arthropods and mollusks were found about twice as often at the water source than at the control (equivalent to 86 more observations on the wet pouch than on dry at each site, on average), with ants accounting for over 50% of the overall response in urban areas. Daily fluctuations in vapor pressure deficit (VPD) best predicted daily variation in water demand behavior, with increased demand at higher VPD. Mean VPD was generally highest near urbanized areas, but effects of VPD on water demand behavior were generally lower in urbanized areas (possibly related to reductions in overall abundance reducing the potential response). On certain days, VPD was high in natural areas and greenspaces, and this coincided with the highest arthropod water demand behavior observed. Our results suggest that terrestrial arthropod communities do experience periods of water demand within mesic regions, including in greenspaces outside cities, where they appear to respond strongly to short periods of dry conditions—an observation with potential relevance for understanding the effects of climate change.

SUBMITTER: Becker J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8608307 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:BACKGROUND:The immense geologic and ecological complexity of the Caribbean has created a natural laboratory for interpreting when and how organisms disperse through time and space. However, competing hypotheses compounded with this complexity have resulted in a lack of unifying principles of biogeography for the region. Though new data concerning the timing of geologic events and dispersal events are emerging, powerful new analytical tools now allow for explicit hypothesis testing. Arthropods, with varying dispersal ability and high levels of endemism in the Caribbean, are an important, albeit understudied, biogeographic model system. Herein, we include a comprehensive analysis of every publicly available genetic dataset (at the time of writing) of terrestrial Caribbean arthropod groups using a statistically robust pipeline to explicitly test the current extent of biogeographic hypotheses for the region. RESULTS:Our findings indicate several important biogeographic generalizations for the region: the South American continent is the predominant origin of Caribbean arthropod fauna; GAARlandia played a role for some taxa in aiding dispersal from South America to the Greater Antilles; founder event dispersal explains the majority of dispersal events by terrestrial arthropods, and distance between landmasses is important for dispersal; most dispersal events occurred via island hopping; there is evidence of 'reverse' dispersal from islands to the mainland; dispersal across the present-day Isthmus of Panama generally occurred prior to 3 mya; the Greater Antilles harbor more lineage diversity than the Lesser Antilles, and the larger Greater Antilles typically have greater lineage diversity than the smaller islands; basal Caribbean taxa are primarily distributed in the Greater Antilles, the basal-most being from Cuba, and derived taxa are mostly distributed in the Lesser Antilles; Jamaican taxa are usually endemic and monophyletic. CONCLUSIONS:Given the diversity and deep history of terrestrial arthropods, incongruence of biogeographic patterns is expected, but focusing on both similarities and differences among divergent taxa with disparate life histories emphasizes the importance of particular qualities responsible for resulting diversification patterns. Furthermore, this study provides an analytical toolkit that can be used to guide researchers interested in answering questions pertaining to Caribbean biogeography using explicit hypothesis testing.

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Water-seeking behavior among terrestrial arthropods and mollusks in a cool mesic region: Spatial and temporal patterns

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