Xiaoxiao Li, Wei Yang, Mark Novak, Lei Zhao, Peter C. de Ruiter, Zhifeng Yang, Christian Guill
{"title":"Body Mass–Biomass Scaling Modulates Species Keystone-Ness to Press Perturbations","authors":"Xiaoxiao Li, Wei Yang, Mark Novak, Lei Zhao, Peter C. de Ruiter, Zhifeng Yang, Christian Guill","doi":"10.1111/ele.70086","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.70086","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Identifying species with disproportionate effects on other species under press perturbations is essential, yet how species traits and community context drive their ‘keystone-ness’ remain unclear. We quantified keystone-ness as linearly approximated per capita net effect derived from normalised inverse community matrices and as non-linear per capita community biomass change from simulated perturbations in food webs with varying biomass structure. In bottom-heavy webs (negative relationship between species' body mass and their biomass within the web), larger species at higher trophic levels tended to be keystone species, whereas in top-heavy webs (positive body mass to biomass relationship), the opposite was true and the relationships between species' energetic traits and keystone-ness were weakened or reversed compared to bottom-heavy webs. Linear approximations aligned well with non-linear responses in bottom-heavy webs, but were less consistent in top-heavy webs. These findings highlight the importance of community context in shaping species' keystone-ness and informing effective conservation actions.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143431734","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Mai Lazarus, Naama Kimmerling, Tamara Gurevich, Moshe Kiflawi, Sean R. Connolly, Roi Holzman, Jonathan Belmaker
{"title":"Post-Larval Processes Reduce the Diversity of Coral Reef Fish Communities","authors":"Mai Lazarus, Naama Kimmerling, Tamara Gurevich, Moshe Kiflawi, Sean R. Connolly, Roi Holzman, Jonathan Belmaker","doi":"10.1111/ele.70058","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.70058","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>The difficulties in obtaining species-level abundance estimates of marine larvae have hindered comparisons of diversity across life stages, severely limiting our knowledge of how adult diversity is maintained. To explore factors shaping diversity across life stages, we surveyed adult coral reef fishes, compiled data on their ecological and life history traits and paired these with a unique dataset of species-level larval abundances. Relative larval abundance was more even compared to adults and matched random expectations, whereas the adult community was markedly uneven and less functionally diverse, suggesting species filtering effects. While adult abundance was positively linked to larval abundance, species size and diet altered this association, with larger and non-planktivorous adults being less abundant than expected from their larval supply. Our results illustrate that while larval supply is important in determining adult taxonomic and functional diversity, post-larval processes increase the numerical dominance of particular species, thus reducing overall diversity.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143431736","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Taoping Wu, Anoushka A. Rodrigues, Tom M. Fayle, Lee M. Henry
{"title":"Defensive Symbiont Genotype Distributions Are Linked to Parasitoid Attack Networks","authors":"Taoping Wu, Anoushka A. Rodrigues, Tom M. Fayle, Lee M. Henry","doi":"10.1111/ele.70082","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.70082","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Facultative symbionts are widespread in arthropods and can provide important services such as protection from natural enemies. Yet what shapes associations with defensive symbionts in nature remains unclear. Two hypotheses suggest that interactions with either antagonists or host plants explain the prevalence of symbionts through shared selective pressures or vectors of symbiont transmission. Here we investigate the factors determining similarities in the <i>Hamiltonella defensa</i> symbiosis shared amongst field-collected aphid species. After accounting for host species relatedness, we find that <i>Hamiltonella's</i> genotype distribution aligns with sharing the same parasitoids, rather than host plants, highlighting parasitoids and hosts as key selective agents shaping the symbiosis across aphid species. Our data indicates parasitoid host specificity drives the prevalence of specific aphid-<i>Hamiltonella</i> associations, suggesting defensive symbioses are maintained by the selective pressure imposed by dominant parasitoids and their aphid hosts. These findings underscore the importance of interactions with natural enemies in explaining patterns of defensive symbiosis in nature.</p>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/ele.70082","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143431733","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Joe P. Woodman, Stefan J. G. Vriend, Frank Adriaensen, Elena Álvarez, Alexander Artemyev, Emilio Barba, Malcolm D. Burgess, Samuel P. Caro, Laure Cauchard, Anne Charmantier, Ella F. Cole, Niels Dingemanse, Blandine Doligez, Tapio Eeva, Simon R. Evans, Arnaud Grégoire, Marcel Lambrechts, Agu Leivits, András Liker, Erik Matthysen, Markku Orell, John S. Park, Seppo Rytkönen, Juan Carlos Senar, Gábor Seress, Marta Szulkin, Kees van Oers, Emma Vatka, Marcel E. Visser, Josh A. Firth, Ben C. Sheldon
{"title":"Continent-Wide Drivers of Spatial Synchrony in Breeding Demographic Structure Across Wild Great Tit Populations","authors":"Joe P. Woodman, Stefan J. G. Vriend, Frank Adriaensen, Elena Álvarez, Alexander Artemyev, Emilio Barba, Malcolm D. Burgess, Samuel P. Caro, Laure Cauchard, Anne Charmantier, Ella F. Cole, Niels Dingemanse, Blandine Doligez, Tapio Eeva, Simon R. Evans, Arnaud Grégoire, Marcel Lambrechts, Agu Leivits, András Liker, Erik Matthysen, Markku Orell, John S. Park, Seppo Rytkönen, Juan Carlos Senar, Gábor Seress, Marta Szulkin, Kees van Oers, Emma Vatka, Marcel E. Visser, Josh A. Firth, Ben C. Sheldon","doi":"10.1111/ele.70079","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.70079","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Variation in age structure influences population dynamics, yet we have limited understanding of the spatial scale at which its fluctuations are synchronised between populations. Using 32 great tit populations, spanning 4° W–33° E and 35°–65° N involving > 130,000 birds across 67 years, we quantify spatial synchrony in breeding demographic structure (subadult vs. adult breeders) and its drivers. We show that larger clutch sizes, colder winters, and larger beech crops lead to younger populations. We report distance-dependent synchrony of demographic structure, maintained at approximately 650 km. Despite covariation with demographic structure, we do not find evidence for environmental variables influencing the scale of synchrony, except for beech masting. We suggest that local ecological and density-dependent dynamics impact how environmental variation interacts with demographic structure, influencing estimates of the environment's effect on synchrony. Our analyses demonstrate the operation of synchrony in demographic structure over large scales, with implications for age-dependent demography in populations.</p>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/ele.70079","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143431731","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Anning Zhang, Shuyan Chen, Ziyang Liu, Jingwei Chen, Hongxian Song, Hanwen Cui, Zi Yang, Sa Xiao, Lizhe An, Mark A. Genung
{"title":"Changes in Plant Biomass Are Driven by Persisting Plant Species, but Species Gains Drive Nematode Carbon Dynamics","authors":"Anning Zhang, Shuyan Chen, Ziyang Liu, Jingwei Chen, Hongxian Song, Hanwen Cui, Zi Yang, Sa Xiao, Lizhe An, Mark A. Genung","doi":"10.1111/ele.70070","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ele.70070","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Global change drivers, such as shrub encroachment, alter above- and belowground communities, and the consequences of these changes for ecosystem functioning are largely unknown. We used the modified Price equation to quantify how the presence of shrubs alters the richness, composition, and abundance of plant and nematode communities and the resulting effects on ecosystem functioning (i.e., plant biomass and nematode carbon [C] metabolism) on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Plots with shrubs had increased plant biomass (mostly due to persisting plant species producing more biomass) and nematode C metabolism (mostly due to increases in nematode species richness). The strength of the species richness effect on plant biomass was positively associated with the strength of the species richness on nematode C metabolism. Increases in the biomass of persisting species and species gains promote plant biomass and nematode C metabolism, respectively, which may accelerate decomposition and C turnover on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143427145","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Rebecca Schalkowski, Katja R. Kasimatis, Megan A. Greischar, Asher D. Cutter
{"title":"Reproductive Interference Alters Species Coexistence in Nematodes due to Asymmetric Sperm-Induced Harm","authors":"Rebecca Schalkowski, Katja R. Kasimatis, Megan A. Greischar, Asher D. Cutter","doi":"10.1111/ele.70067","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ele.70067","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Species coexistence is shaped by a range of biotic and abiotic factors. Beyond predation, parasitism and competition, one species may interfere with another's reproduction to induce sexual exclusion from a habitat. Here, we test for reproductive interference from inter-species mating between sympatric nematodes <i>Caenorhabditis macrosperma</i> and <i>C. nouraguensis</i>. Higher intrinsic population growth of <i>C. nouraguensis</i> arises from greater reproductive output by both sexes, predicting it to be superior in resource competition<i>.</i> Mate discrimination between species is incomplete, however, with inter-species mating errors reducing lifespan and reproductive fitness of female <i>C. nouraguensis</i> only. These asymmetric costs arise within hours, due to ectopic migration of <i>C. macrosperma</i>'s giant sperm cells. We modelled the population dynamic impacts of reproductive interference, then confirmed rapid sexual exclusion in mixed-species communities with multi-generation experiments. These findings demonstrate the profound ecological implications of reproductive interference for demographic parameters and species coexistence through a cell-mediated mechanism of inter-species harm.</p>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/ele.70067","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143083574","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Ursula Gaedke, Xiaoxiao Li, Christian Guill, Lia Hemerik, Peter C. de Ruiter
{"title":"Seasonal Shifts in Trophic Interaction Strength Drive Stability of Natural Food Webs","authors":"Ursula Gaedke, Xiaoxiao Li, Christian Guill, Lia Hemerik, Peter C. de Ruiter","doi":"10.1111/ele.70075","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ele.70075","url":null,"abstract":"<p>It remains challenging to understand why natural food webs are remarkably stable despite highly variable environmental factors and population densities. We investigated the dynamics in the structure and stability of Lake Constance's pelagic food web using 7 years of high-frequency observations of biomasses and production, leading to 59 seasonally resolved quantitative food web descriptions. We assessed the dynamics in asymptotic food web stability through maximum loop weight, which revealed underlying stability mechanisms. Maximum loop weight showed a recurrent seasonal pattern with a consistently high stability despite pronounced dynamics in biomasses, fluxes and productivity. This stability resulted from seasonal rewiring of the food web, driven by energetic constraints within loops and their embedding into food web structure. The stabilising restructuring emerged from counter-acting effects of metabolic activity and competitiveness/susceptibility to predation within a diverse grazer community on loop weight. This underscores the role of functional diversity in promoting food web stability.</p>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/ele.70075","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143072511","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
Arianna I. Krinos, Sara K. Shapiro, Weixuan Li, Sheean T. Haley, Sonya T. Dyhrman, Stephanie Dutkiewicz, Michael J. Follows, Harriet Alexander
{"title":"Intraspecific Diversity in Thermal Performance Determines Phytoplankton Ecological Niche","authors":"Arianna I. Krinos, Sara K. Shapiro, Weixuan Li, Sheean T. Haley, Sonya T. Dyhrman, Stephanie Dutkiewicz, Michael J. Follows, Harriet Alexander","doi":"10.1111/ele.70055","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ele.70055","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Temperature has a primary influence on phytoplankton physiology and ecology. We grew 12 strains of <i>Gephyrocapsa huxleyi</i> isolated from different-temperature regions for ~45 generations (2 months) and characterised acclimated thermal response curves across a temperature range. Even with similar temperature optima and overlapping cell size, strain growth rates varied between 0.45 and 1 day<sup>−1</sup>. Thermal niche widths varied from 16.7°C to 24.8°C, suggesting that strains use distinct thermal response mechanisms. We investigated the implications of this thermal intraspecific diversity using an ocean ecosystem simulation resolving phytoplankton thermal phenotypes. Model analogues of thermal ‘generalists’ and ‘specialists’ resulted in a distinctive global biogeography of thermal niche widths with a nonlinear latitudinal pattern. We leveraged model output to predict ranges of the 12 lab-reared strains and demonstrated how this approach could broadly refine geographic range predictions. Our combination of observations and modelled biogeography highlights the capacity of diverse groups to survive temperature shifts.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143056647","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}
François Duchenne, Elisa Barreto, Esteban A. Guevara, Holger Beck, Carolina Bello, Rafaela Bobato, Daniela Bôlla, Emanuel Brenes, Nicole Büttner, Ana P. Caron, Nelson Chaves-Elizondo, María J. Gavilanes, Alejandro Restrepo-González, Jose Alejandro Castro, Miriam Kaehler, Tiago Machado-de-Souza, Miguel Machnicki-Reis, Andrés Sebastián F. Marcayata, Cauã G. de Menezes, Andrea Nieto, Rafael de Oliveira, Ricardo A. C. de Oliveira, Friederike Richter, Bryan G. Rojas, Luciele L. Romanowski, Wellinton L. de Souza, Danila S. Veluza, Ben Weinstein, Rafael O. Wüest, Thais B. Zanata, Krystal Zuniga, María A. Maglianesi, Tatiana Santander, Isabela G. Varassin, Catherine H. Graham
{"title":"A Probabilistic View of Forbidden Links: Their Prevalence and Their Consequences for the Robustness of Plant–Hummingbird Communities","authors":"François Duchenne, Elisa Barreto, Esteban A. Guevara, Holger Beck, Carolina Bello, Rafaela Bobato, Daniela Bôlla, Emanuel Brenes, Nicole Büttner, Ana P. Caron, Nelson Chaves-Elizondo, María J. Gavilanes, Alejandro Restrepo-González, Jose Alejandro Castro, Miriam Kaehler, Tiago Machado-de-Souza, Miguel Machnicki-Reis, Andrés Sebastián F. Marcayata, Cauã G. de Menezes, Andrea Nieto, Rafael de Oliveira, Ricardo A. C. de Oliveira, Friederike Richter, Bryan G. Rojas, Luciele L. Romanowski, Wellinton L. de Souza, Danila S. Veluza, Ben Weinstein, Rafael O. Wüest, Thais B. Zanata, Krystal Zuniga, María A. Maglianesi, Tatiana Santander, Isabela G. Varassin, Catherine H. Graham","doi":"10.1111/ele.70073","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ele.70073","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>The presence in ecological communities of unfeasible species interactions, termed forbidden links, due to physiological or morphological exploitation barriers has been long debated, but little direct evidence has been found. Forbidden links are likely to make ecological communities less robust to species extinctions, stressing the need to assess their prevalence. Here, we used a dataset of plant–hummingbird interactions, coupled with a Bayesian hierarchical model, to assess the importance of exploitation barriers in determining species interactions. We found evidence for exploitation barriers between flowers and hummingbirds across the 32 studied communities; however, the proportion of forbidden links changed drastically among communities because of changes in trait distributions. The higher the proportion of forbidden links, the more they decreased network robustness because of constraints on interaction rewiring. Our results suggest that exploitation barriers are not rare in plant–hummingbird communities and have the potential to limit the rescue of species experiencing partner extinction.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-01-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143050879","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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":"A Non-Equilibrium Species Distribution Model Reveals Unprecedented Depth of Time Lag Responses to Past Environmental Change Trajectories","authors":"Etienne Lalechère, Ronan Marrec, Jonathan Lenoir","doi":"10.1111/ele.70040","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ele.70040","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Previous studies have demonstrated legacy effects of current species distributions to past environmental conditions, but the temporal extent of such time lag dynamics remains unknown. Here, we have developed a non-equilibrium Species Distribution Modelling (SDM) approach quantifying the temporal extent that must be taken into account to capture 95% of the effect that a given time series of past environmental conditions has on the current distribution of a species. We applied this approach on the distribution of 92 European forest birds in response to past trajectories of change in forest cover and climate. We found that non-equilibrium SDMs outperformed traditional SDMs for 95% of the species. Non-equilibrium SDMs suggest unprecedented long-lasting effects of past global changes (average time lag extent ranged from 9 to 231 years). This framework can help to relax the equilibrium hypothesis of traditional SDMs and to improve future predictions of biodiversity redistribution in response to global changes.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":161,"journal":{"name":"Ecology Letters","volume":"28 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":7.6,"publicationDate":"2025-01-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143026373","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"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}