Linking patterns and processes of tree community assembly across spatial scales in tropical montane forests

Most of our understanding of island diversity comes from the study of aboveground systems, while the patterns and processes of diversification and community assembly for belowground biotas remain poorly understood. Here we take advantage of a relatively young and dynamic oceanic island to advance our understanding of eco-evolutionary processes driving community assembly within soil mesofauna. Using whole organism community DNA (wocDNA) metabarcoding and the recently developed metaMATE pipeline, we have generated spatially explicit and reliable haplotype-level DNA sequence data for soil mesofaunal assemblages sampled across the four main habitats within the island of Tenerife. Community ecological and metaphylogeographic analyses have been performed at multiple levels of genetic similarity, from haplotypes to species and supraspecific groupings. Broadly consistent patterns of local-scale species richness across different insular habitats have been found, whereas local insular richness is lower than in continental settings. Our results reveal an important role for niche conservatism as a driver of insular community assembly of soil mesofauna, with only limited evidence for habitat shifts promoting diversification. Furthermore, support is found for a fundamental role of habitat in the assembly of soil mesofauna, where habitat specialism is mainly due to colonisation and the establishment of preadapted species. Hierarchical patterns of distance decay at the community level and metaphylogeographical analyses support a pattern of geographic structuring over limited spatial scales, from the level of haplotypes through to species and lineages, as expected for taxa with strong dispersal limitations. Our results demonstrate the potential for wocDNA metabarcoding to advance our understanding of biodiversity.

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Faculty Opinions recommendation of Functional traits and niche-based tree community assembly in an Amazonian forest.

Faculty Opinions – Post-Publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature ◽

10.3410/f.1127088.584230 ◽

2008 ◽

Author(s):

Mark Rees

Keyword(s):

Functional Traits ◽

Community Assembly ◽

Amazonian Forest ◽

Tree Community

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A Test of Nutrient Limitation in Two Tropical Montane Forests Using Root Ingrowth Cores1

Biotropica ◽

10.1111/j.1744-7429.2000.tb00481.x ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 32 (2) ◽

pp. 369-373 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

Christopher G. Stewart

Keyword(s):

Nutrient Limitation ◽

Montane Forests ◽

Tropical Montane Forests

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Height-diameter allometry and above ground biomass in tropical montane forests: Insights from the Albertine Rift in Africa

PLoS ONE ◽

10.1371/journal.pone.0179653 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 12 (6) ◽

pp. e0179653 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Gérard Imani ◽

Faustin Boyemba ◽

Simon Lewis ◽

Nsharwasi Léon Nabahungu ◽

Kim Calders ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Above Ground Biomass ◽

Montane Forests ◽

Albertine Rift ◽

Ground Biomass ◽

Tropical Montane Forests

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Functional and phylogenetic assembly in a Chinese tropical tree community across size classes, spatial scales and habitats

Functional Ecology ◽

10.1111/1365-2435.12176 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 28 (2) ◽

pp. 520-529 ◽

Cited By ~ 77

Author(s):

Jie Yang ◽

Guocheng Zhang ◽

Xiuqin Ci ◽

Nathan G. Swenson ◽

Min Cao ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Spatial Scales ◽

Tropical Tree ◽

Size Classes ◽

Tree Community

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Multi-scale data on intertidal macrobenthic biodiversity and environmental features in three New Zealand harbours

10.5194/essd-2019-151 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Casper Kraan ◽

Barry L. Greenfield ◽

Simon F. Thrush

Keyword(s):

New Zealand ◽

Environmental Variables ◽

Spatial Organization ◽

Spatial Scales ◽

Species Distributions ◽

Sediment Grain Size ◽

High Resolution Data ◽

Multi Scale ◽

Grain Size Distributions ◽

Patterns And Processes

Abstract. Understanding how the plants and animals that live in the seafloor vary in their spatial patterns of diversity and abundance is fundamental to gaining insight in the role of biodiversity in maintaining ecosystem functioning in coastal ecosystems, as well as advancing the modelling of species distributions under realistic assumptions. Yet, it is virtually unknown how the relationships between abundance patterns and different biotic and environmental processes change depending on spatial scales, which is mainly due to a lack of data. Within the project Spatial Organization of Species Distributions: Hierarchical and Scale-Dependent Patterns and Processes in Coastal Seascapes at the National Institute for Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) in New Zealand we collected multi-scale and high-resolution data on macrobenthic biodiversity. We found 146 species, i.e. bivalves, polychaetes and crustaceans (> 500 μm) that live hidden in marine sandflats, and collected point measurements of important environmental variables (sediment grain-size distributions, chlorophyll a concentration, and visible sandflat parameters) in three large intertidal Harbours (Kaipara, Tauranga and Manukau). In each Harbour we sampled 400 points for macrobenthic community composition and abundances, as well as the full set of environmental variables. Using an elaborate sampling design, we were able to cover scales from 30 centimetres to a maximal extent of 1 km. All data and extensive metadata are available from the data publisher PANGAEA via the persistent identifier https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.903448.

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Variant responses of tree seedling to seasonal drought stress along an elevational transect in tropical montane forests

Scientific Reports ◽

10.1038/srep36438 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 6 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Xiaoyang Song ◽

Jieqiong Li ◽

Wenfu Zhang ◽

Yong Tang ◽

Zhenhua Sun ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Drought Stress ◽

Tree Seedling ◽

Montane Forests ◽

Seasonal Drought ◽

Tropical Montane Forests ◽

Elevational Transect

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Scaling Issues in Landscape Ecology

Essentials of Landscape Ecology ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198838388.003.0002 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 14-41

Author(s):

Kimberly A. With

Keyword(s):

Landscape Ecology ◽

Spatial Patterns ◽

Spatial Scales ◽

Ecological Data ◽

Ecological Forecasting ◽

Spatial And Temporal Scales ◽

Time Periods ◽

Patterns And Processes ◽

Short Time ◽

Over Time

Spatial patterns are ubiquitous in nature, and ecological systems exhibit patchiness (heterogeneity) across a range of spatial and temporal scales. Landscape ecology is explicitly concerned with understanding how scale affects the measurement of heterogeneity and the scale(s) at which spatial pattern is important for ecological phenomena. Patterns and processes measured at fine spatial scales and over short time periods are unlikely to behave similarly at broader scales and extended time periods. An understanding of pattern-process linkages, a major research focus in landscape ecology, thus requires an understanding of how patterns change with scale, spatially and temporally. The development of methods for extrapolating information across scales is necessary for predicting how landscapes will change over time as well as for ecological forecasting. This chapter explores how scaling issues affect ecological investigations, discusses problems in identifying the correct scale for research, and outlines when and how ecological data can be extrapolated.

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