Ecology最新文献

{"title":"Predictive models are indeed useful for causal inference","authors":"James D. Nichols,&nbsp;Evan G. Cooch","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4517","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4517","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The subject of investigating causation in ecology has been widely discussed in recent years, especially by advocates of a structural causal model (SCM) approach. Some of these advocates have criticized the use of predictive models and model selection for drawing inferences about causation. We argue that the comparison of model-based predictions with observations is a key step in hypothetico-deductive (H-D) science and remains a valid approach for assessing causation. We draw a distinction between two approaches to inference based on predictive modeling. The first approach is not guided by causal hypotheses and focuses on the relationship between a (typically) single response variable and a potentially large number of covariates. We agree that this approach does not yield useful inferences about causation and is primarily useful for hypothesis generation. The second approach follows a H-D framework and is guided by specific hypotheses about causal relationships. We believe that this has been, and continues to be, a useful approach to causal inference. Here, we first define different kinds of causation, arguing that a “probability-raisers-of-processes” definition is especially appropriate for many ecological systems. We outline different scientific “designs” for generating the observations used to investigate causation. We briefly outline some relevant components of the SCM and H-D approaches to investigating causation, emphasizing a H-D approach that focuses on modeling causal effects on vital rate (e.g., rates of survival, recruitment, local extinction, colonization) parameters underlying system dynamics. We consider criticisms of predictive modeling leveled by some SCM proponents and provide two example analyses of ecological systems that use predictive modeling and avoid these criticisms. We conclude that predictive models have been, and can continue to be, useful for providing inferences about causation.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143026265","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Putting seedlings on the map: Trade-offs in demographic rates between ontogenetic size classes in five tropical forests","authors":"Stephan Kambach,&nbsp;Helge Bruelheide,&nbsp;Liza S. Comita,&nbsp;Richard Condit,&nbsp;S. Joseph Wright,&nbsp;Salomón Aguilar,&nbsp;Chia-Hao Chang-Yang,&nbsp;Yu-Yun Chen,&nbsp;Nancy C. Garwood,&nbsp;Stephen P. Hubbell,&nbsp;Pei-Jen Luo,&nbsp;Margaret R. Metz,&nbsp;Musalmah Bt. Nasardin,&nbsp;Rolando Pérez,&nbsp;Simon A. Queenborough,&nbsp;I-Fang Sun,&nbsp;Nathan G. Swenson,&nbsp;Jill Thompson,&nbsp;María Uriarte,&nbsp;Renato Valencia,&nbsp;Tze Leong Yao,&nbsp;Jess K. Zimmerman,&nbsp;Nadja Rüger","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4527","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4527","url":null,"abstract":"<p>All species must partition resources among the processes that underly growth, survival, and reproduction. The resulting demographic trade-offs constrain the range of viable life-history strategies and are hypothesized to promote local coexistence. Tropical forests pose ideal systems to study demographic trade-offs as they have a high diversity of coexisting tree species whose life-history strategies tend to align along two orthogonal axes of variation: a growth–survival trade-off that separates species with fast growth from species with high survival and a stature–recruitment trade-off that separates species that achieve large stature from species with high recruitment. As these trade-offs have typically been explored for trees ≥1 cm dbh, it is unclear how species' growth and survival during earliest seedling stages are related to the trade-offs for trees ≥1 cm dbh. Here, we used principal components and correlation analyses to (1) determine the main demographic trade-offs among seed-to-seedling transition rates and growth and survival rates from the seedling to overstory size classes of 1188 tree species from large-scale forest dynamics plots in Panama, Puerto Rico, Ecuador, Taiwan, and Malaysia and (2) quantify the predictive power of maximum dbh, wood density, seed mass, and specific leaf area for species' position along these demographic trade-off gradients. In four out of five forests, the growth–survival trade-off was the most important demographic trade-off and encompassed growth and survival of both seedlings and trees ≥1 cm dbh. The second most important trade-off separated species with relatively fast growth and high survival at the seedling stage from species with relatively fast growth and high survival ≥1 cm dbh. The relationship between seed-to-seedling transition rates and these two trade-off aces differed between sites. All four traits were significant predictors for species' position along the two trade-off gradients, albeit with varying importance. We concluded that, after accounting for the species' position along the growth–survival trade-off, tree species tend to trade off growth and survival at the seedling with later life stages. This ontogenetic trade-off offers a mechanistic explanation for the stature–recruitment trade-off that constitutes an additional ontogenetic dimension of life-history variation in species-rich ecosystems.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11755001/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143026266","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Pointed-snout wrasse builds nest on Sarcotragus foetidus sponges","authors":"Francesca Strano,&nbsp;Francesco Tiralongo,&nbsp;Valerio Micaroni","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4531","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4531","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt;Fishes belonging to the genus &lt;i&gt;Symphodus&lt;/i&gt;, commonly called wrasses (Labridae family), exhibit diverse nesting behaviors among different species, ranging from elaborate to rudimentary nests, and in some cases no nests at all (Hanel et al., &lt;span&gt;2002&lt;/span&gt;; Warner &amp; Lejeune, &lt;span&gt;1985&lt;/span&gt;). The nests, when built, are primarily constructed using algae of various species, which provide a secure environment for egg deposition and protection, playing a crucial role in the reproductive success of these species (Quignard &amp; Pras, &lt;span&gt;1986&lt;/span&gt;). The Pointed-snout wrasse (&lt;i&gt;Symphodus rostratus&lt;/i&gt;), a common Mediterranean species, exhibits complex nesting behaviors (Hanel et al., &lt;span&gt;2002&lt;/span&gt;), which are essential for mate selection (Alonzo &amp; Heckman, &lt;span&gt;2010&lt;/span&gt;).&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;During a rebreather training dive along the Apulian coast (Santa Caterina, Ionian Sea; 40°08′15.4″ N, 17°58′52.3″ E), the 20th of March 2024, at a depth between 12 and 17 m, we encountered large specimens (40 cm in diameter) of the sponge &lt;i&gt;Sarcotragus foetidus&lt;/i&gt; with systematically arranged mounds of biogenic material, including shell, sea urchin test, and bryozoan fragments on their surface (Figure 1). In this context, we observed a mature male of the Pointed-snout wrasse actively transporting these fragments and placing them on one of these sponges (Video S1), engaging in nest-building behavior (Taborsky et al., &lt;span&gt;1987&lt;/span&gt;). Throughout our dive, we documented nine instances of &lt;i&gt;S. rostratus&lt;/i&gt; nests constructed on &lt;i&gt;S. foetidus&lt;/i&gt;, each between 30 and 40 cm in diameter. In one case, we observed and filmed (GoPro HERO 8 Black) a female engaging in mating behavior with a reproductive male (Video S2). This observation is significant, as the use of calcareous biogenic materials and the selection of sponges as a nesting substrate in &lt;i&gt;S. rostratus&lt;/i&gt; had never been reported until now. The Pointed-snout wrasse indeed, typically builds its nets using algae as the primary material, selecting areas rich in vegetation. This species is commonly observed constructing nests among algal beds, which provide both camouflage and structural support to eggs. The finding of several nests on different sponges within the same site suggests the possibility of observational learning or “copy-cat” behavior among reproductive male &lt;i&gt;S. rostratus&lt;/i&gt;. Copying behavior have been documented in Ocellated wrasse (&lt;i&gt;Symphodus ocellatus&lt;/i&gt;), where female mate choice copying can influence sexual selection (Alonzo, &lt;span&gt;2008&lt;/span&gt;), and if confirmed, this would represent a novel example of observational learning in the nesting behaviors of &lt;i&gt;S. rostratus&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Sponges play crucial ecological functions in marine ecosystems, often providing habitats for other organisms at various spatial scales (Bell et al., &lt;span&gt;2023&lt;/span&gt;). Deep-sea glass sponge reefs are known to be refuge and nursery grounds for demersal fish (Barthel, &lt;span&gt;1997&lt;/span&gt;; Maldonado ","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11751700/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143017698","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Seagrass wasting disease prevalence and lesion area increase with invertebrate grazing across the northeastern Pacific","authors":"Lillian R. Aoki,&nbsp;Carmen J. Ritter,&nbsp;Deanna S. Beatty,&nbsp;Lia K. Domke,&nbsp;Ginny L. Eckert,&nbsp;Olivia J. Graham,&nbsp;Carla P. Gomes,&nbsp;Collin Gross,&nbsp;Timothy L. Hawthorne,&nbsp;Eliza Heery,&nbsp;Margot Hessing-Lewis,&nbsp;Kevin Hovel,&nbsp;Karl Koehler,&nbsp;Zachary L. Monteith,&nbsp;Ryan S. Mueller,&nbsp;Angeleen M. Olson,&nbsp;Carolyn Prentice,&nbsp;Brendan Rappazzo,&nbsp;John J. Stachowicz,&nbsp;Fiona Tomas,&nbsp;Bo Yang,&nbsp;C. Drew Harvell,&nbsp;J. Emmett Duffy","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4532","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4532","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Disease is a key driver of community and ecosystem structure, especially when it strikes foundation species. In the widespread marine foundation species eelgrass (<i>Zostera marina</i>), outbreaks of wasting disease have caused large-scale meadow collapse in the past, and the causative pathogen, <i>Labyrinthula zosterae</i>, is commonly found in meadows globally. Research to date has mainly focused on abiotic environmental drivers of seagrass wasting disease, but there is strong evidence from other systems that biotic interactions such as herbivory can facilitate plant diseases. How biotic interactions influence seagrass wasting disease in the field is unknown but is potentially important for understanding dynamics of this globally valuable and declining habitat. Here, we investigated links between epifaunal grazers and seagrass wasting disease using a latitudinal field study across 32 eelgrass meadows distributed from southeastern Alaska to southern California. From 2019 to 2021, we conducted annual surveys to assess eelgrass shoot density, morphology, epifauna community, and the prevalence and lesion area of wasting disease infections. We integrated field data with satellite measurements of sea surface temperature and used structural equation modeling to test the magnitude and direction of possible drivers of wasting disease. Our results show that grazing by small invertebrates was associated with a 29% increase in prevalence of wasting disease infections and that both the prevalence and lesion area of disease increased with total epifauna abundances. Furthermore, these relationships differed among taxa; disease levels increased with snail (<i>Lacuna</i> spp.) and idoteid isopod abundances but were not related to abundance of ampithoid amphipods. This field study across 23° of latitude suggests a prominent role for invertebrate consumers in facilitating disease outbreaks with potentially large impacts on coastal seagrass ecosystems.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11754935/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143024811","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The year of a leaf: Tracking the fate of leaf litter and its nutrients during aquatic decomposition and consumption","authors":"Eva Cereghetti,&nbsp;Raphaël Bossart,&nbsp;Andreas Bruder,&nbsp;Andrin Krähenbühl,&nbsp;Franziska Wolf,&nbsp;Florian Altermatt","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4520","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4520","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Temperate streams are subsidized by inputs of leaf litter peaking in fall. Yet, stream communities decompose dead leaves and integrate their energy into the aquatic food web throughout the whole year. Most studies investigating stream decomposition largely overlook long-term trajectories, which must be understood for an appropriate temporal upscaling of ecosystem processes. Using mesocosms, we quantified changes in carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus content of three leaf species during decomposition at weekly to multi-month intervals for up to a year; then, we tested how decomposition duration affected the subsequent consumption by a keystone amphipod macroinvertebrate. Over a year, nitrogen and phosphorus percentage increased across all leaf species, but only the recalcitrant species maintained initial levels of absolute nitrogen and phosphorus. Prolonged decomposition barely affected or impaired amphipod consumption of labile leaf species, whereas it enhanced feeding on the recalcitrant species. Overall, we demonstrate that recalcitrant leaves might serve as longer stored potential resources for when labile species have already been consumed and that their increasing palatability observed over multi-month intervals of sustained decomposition may stabilize fluctuations in the rates of leaf litter integration into aquatic food webs. This yearlong perspective highlights the relevancy of slow-decomposing leaves for aquatic detrital communities.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/ecy.4520","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142992190","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Parasitoid avoidance of intraguild predation drives enemy complementarity in a multi-trophic ecological network","authors":"Andrew B. Hennessy,&nbsp;Riley M. Anderson,&nbsp;Nora Mitchell,&nbsp;Kailen A. Mooney,&nbsp;Michael S. Singer","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4483","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4483","url":null,"abstract":"<p>How consumer diversity determines consumption efficiency is a central issue in ecology. In the context of predation and biological control, this relationship concerns predator diversity and predation efficiency. Reduced predation efficiency can result from different predator taxa eating each other in addition to their common prey (interference due to intraguild predation). By contrast, multiple predator taxa with overlapping but complementary feeding niches can generate increased predation efficiency on their common prey (enemy complementarity). When viewed strictly from an ecological perspective, intraguild predation and enemy complementarity are opposing forces. However, from an evolutionary ecology perspective, predators facing strong intraguild predation may evolve traits that reduce their predation risk, possibly leading to niche complementarity between enemies; thus, selection from intraguild predation may lead to enemy complementarity rather than opposing it. As specialized predators that live in or on their hosts, parasitoids are subjected to intraguild predation from generalist predators that consume the parasitoids' hosts. The degree to which parasitoid–predator interactions are ruled by interference versus enemy complementarity has been debated. Here, we address this issue with field experiments in a forest community consisting of multiple species of trees, herbivorous caterpillars, parasitoids, ants, and birds. Our experiments and analyses found no interference effects, but revealed clear evidence for complementarity between parasitoids and birds (not ants). Parasitism rates by hymenopterans and dipterans were negatively associated with bird predation risk, and the variation in the strength of this negative association suggests that this enemy complementarity was due to parasitoid avoidance of intraguild predation. We further argue that avoidance of intraguild predation by parasitoids and other arthropod predators may explain enigmatic patterns in vertebrate–arthropod–plant food webs in a variety of terrestrial ecosystems.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143017608","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Priority effects can be explained by competitive traits","authors":"Tamara L. H. van Steijn,&nbsp;Paul Kardol,&nbsp;Roland Jansson,&nbsp;Jessica Tjäder,&nbsp;Judith M. Sarneel","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4528","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4528","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Priority effects, the effects of early-arriving species on late-arriving species, are caused by niche preemption and/or niche modification. The strength of priority effects can be determined by the extent of niche preemption and/or modification by the early-arriving species; however, the strength of priority effects may also be influenced by the late-arriving species, as some species may be better adapted to deal with niche preemption and/or modification. Therefore, some combinations of species will likely lead to stronger priority effects than others. We tested priority effects for all pairwise combinations of 15 plant species, including grasses, legumes, and nonleguminous forbs, by comparing simultaneous and sequential arrival orders in a 10-week-long, controlled, pot experiment. We did this by using the competitive effect and response framework, quantifying the ability to suppress a neighbor as the competitive effect and the ability to tolerate a neighbor as the competitive response. We found that when arriving simultaneously, species that caused strong competitive effects also had weaker competitive responses. When arriving sequentially, species that caused strong priority effects when arriving early also had weaker responses to priority effects when arriving late. Among plant functional groups, legumes had the weakest response to priority effects. We also measured plant functional traits related to the plant economic spectrum, which were combined into a principal components analysis (PCA) where the first axis represented a conservative-to-acquisitive trait gradient. Using the PCA species scores, we showed that both the traits of the focal and the neighboring species determined the outcome of competition. Trait dissimilarities between the focal and neighboring species were more important when species arrived sequentially than when species arrived simultaneously. Specifically, priority effects only became weaker when the late-arriving species was more acquisitive than the early-arriving species. Together, our findings show that traits and specifically the interaction of traits between species are more important in determining competition outcomes when species arrive sequentially (i.e., with priority effects present) than when arriving simultaneously.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11751378/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143018123","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Root microbes can improve plant tolerance to insect damage: A systematic review and meta-analysis","authors":"Emily Tronson,&nbsp;Laramy Enders","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4502","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4502","url":null,"abstract":"<p>To limit damage from insect herbivores, plants rely on a blend of defensive mechanisms that includes partnerships with beneficial microbes, particularly those inhabiting roots. While ample evidence exists for microbially mediated resistance responses that directly target insects through changing phytotoxin and volatile profiles, we know surprisingly little about the microbial underpinnings of plant tolerance. Tolerance defenses counteract insect damage via shifts in plant physiology that reallocate resources to fuel compensatory growth, improve photosynthetic efficiency, and reduce oxidative stress. Despite being a powerful mitigator of insect damage, tolerance remains an understudied realm of plant defenses. Here, we propose a novel conceptual framework that can be broadly applied across study systems to characterize microbial impacts on expression of tolerance defenses. We conducted a systematic review of studies quantifying the impact of rhizosphere microbial inoculants on plant tolerance to herbivory based on several measures—biomass, oxidative stress mitigation, or photosynthesis. We identified 40 studies, most of which focused on chewing herbivores (<i>n</i> = 31) and plant growth parameters (e.g., biomass). Next, we performed a meta-analysis investigating the impact of microbial inoculants on plant tolerance to herbivory, which was measured via differences in plant biomass, and compared across key microbe, insect, and plant traits. Thirty-five papers comprising 113 observations were included in this meta-analysis, with effect sizes (Hedges' <i>d</i>) ranging from −4.67 (susceptible) to 18.38 (overcompensation). Overall, microbial inoculants significantly reduce the cost of herbivory via plant growth promotion, with overcompensation and compensation comprising 25% of observations of microbial-mediated tolerance. The grand mean effect size 0.99 [0.49; 1.49] indicates that the addition of a microbial inoculant increased plant biomass by ~1 SD under herbivore stress, thus improving tolerance. This effect was influenced most by microbial attributes, including functional guild and total soil community diversity. Overall, results highlight the need for additional investigation of microbially mediated plant tolerance, particularly in sap-feeding insects and across a more comprehensive range of tolerance mechanisms. Such attention would round out our current understanding of anti-herbivore plant defenses, offer insight into the underlying mechanisms that promote resilience to insect stress, and inform the application of microbial biotechnology to support sustainable agricultural practices.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/ecy.4502","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142992136","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Common juniper, the oldest nonclonal woody species across the tundra biome and the European continent","authors":"Marco Carrer,&nbsp;Raffaella Dibona,&nbsp;Davide Frigo,&nbsp;Ludmila Gorlanova,&nbsp;Rashit Hantemirov,&nbsp;Lucrezia Unterholzner,&nbsp;Signe Normand,&nbsp;Urs Albert Treier,&nbsp;Angela Luisa Prendin","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4514","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4514","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt;One of the most remarkable characteristics of trees, alongside their size, is their longevity. Trees frequently live for several centuries and even well over a thousand years for a limited group of taxa. The number of centennial- or millennial-old woody species is steadily increasing due to continuous discoveries mostly associated with the growing efforts and attention devoted to preserving and studying long-lived individuals (Brown, &lt;span&gt;1996&lt;/span&gt;, &lt;span&gt;2024&lt;/span&gt;). When present, these ancient organisms represent a slowly emerging property in vegetation assemblages, strictly tied to the natural and anthropogenic disturbance history of the ecosystem in which they reside. Given that the presence or replacement of very old woody individuals, ancient woodlands, and primary forests cannot be restored without a significant passage of time, there is an increasing emphasis on recognizing, studying, and protecting them. Manifold are indeed the positive benefits that old woody plants provide: they can be considered hotspots for biodiversity within the ecosystem, promoting the recovery process after disturbance as biological legacies. They also stand as important witnesses to past climate variability, enduring hundreds or thousands of years encompassing warm, wet, dry, or cold phases, along with a multitude of extreme weather events. Finally, due to their extended residence time, old woody plants significantly contribute to increasing and maintaining carbon storage within the ecosystem (Gilhen-Baker et al., &lt;span&gt;2022&lt;/span&gt;), while forest stands hosting old trees act as substantial sinks within the global carbon cycle (Luyssaert et al., &lt;span&gt;2008&lt;/span&gt;), although their impact may be less than previously estimated (Gundersen et al., &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;).&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Nevertheless, within woody plants, the potential to attain extended lifespans is not exclusive to trees. Over the last few years, an increasing body of evidence has shown that even shrubs can endure for centuries. Several reports document the discovery of exceptionally old shrub individuals across a broad range of taxa and environments, from the Tibetan Plateau (Lu et al., &lt;span&gt;2015&lt;/span&gt;) to the Mediterranean (Mathaux et al., &lt;span&gt;2016&lt;/span&gt;) and from the high latitudes (Hallinger et al., &lt;span&gt;2010&lt;/span&gt;; Hantemirov et al., &lt;span&gt;2000&lt;/span&gt;) to the high elevations in the Alps (Carrer et al., &lt;span&gt;2023&lt;/span&gt;; Francon et al., &lt;span&gt;2017&lt;/span&gt;). However, despite their lower stature, shrub communities hold inestimable ecological value and should be considered as important as trees. They usually thrive in extreme environmental conditions. With their prostrate growth habit, shrubs can extend their presence far beyond the latitudinal and elevational limits of trees, acting as the outposts of woody plants from the warm and xeric Mediterranean to cold tundra regions. For this reason, ongoing climate change is likely to induce remarkable consequences in shrub communities, leading to either a","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11751590/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143018811","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Niche partitioning in a periphyton metacommunity peaks at intermediate species richness in midsized rivers","authors":"Thomas Fuß,&nbsp;Lukas Thuile Bistarelli,&nbsp;Robert Ptacnik,&nbsp;Gabriel A. Singer","doi":"10.1002/ecy.4524","DOIUrl":"10.1002/ecy.4524","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The trait-based partitioning of species plays a critical role in biodiversity–ecosystem function relationships. This niche partitioning drives and depends on community structure, yet this link remains elusive in the context of a metacommunity, where local community assembly is dictated by regional dispersal alongside local environmental conditions. Hence, elucidating the coupling of niche partitioning and community structure needs spatially explicit studies. Such studies are particularly necessary in river networks, where local habitats are highly connected by unidirectional water flow in a spatially complex network structure and frequent disturbance makes community structure strongly dependent on recolonization. Here, we show that taxonomic turnover among periphyton communities colonizing deployed bricks (microhabitats) at multiple sampling sites (local habitats) in a river network came along with a turnover in traits. This niche partitioning showed a hump-shaped relationship with richness of periphyton communities, which increased along river size. Our observations suggest downstream dispersal along the river network to increase the regional metacommunity pool, which then ensures local colonization by taxa possessing diverse traits allowing them to efficiently partition into environmentally different microhabitats. However, at the most downstream sites, the excessive dispersal of widespread generalists drove mass effects which inflated richness with taxa that co-occupied several microhabitats and swamped niche partitioning. Further, efficient niche partitioning depended on communities rich in rare taxa, an indication for the importance of specialists. Alarmingly, richness and rare taxa declined with high phosphorus concentrations and conductivity, respectively, two environmental variables which potentially reflected anthropogenic activity.</p>","PeriodicalId":11484,"journal":{"name":"Ecology","volume":"106 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.4,"publicationDate":"2025-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11751593/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143018832","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}