In semi-arid environments, the marked contrast in temperature and precipitation over the year strongly shapes ecological communities. The composition of species and their ecological interactions within a community may vary greatly over time. Although intra-annual variations are often studied, empirical information on how plant–bird relationships are structured within and among years, and how their drivers may change over time are still limited. In this study, we analyzed the temporal dynamics of the structure of plant–hummingbird interaction networks by evaluating changes in species richness, diversity of interactions, modularity, network specialization, nestedness, and β-diversity of interactions throughout four years in a Mexican xeric shrubland landscape. We also evaluated if the relative importance of abundance, phenology, morphology, and nectar sugar content consistently explains the frequency of pairwise interactions between plants and hummingbirds across different years. We found that species richness, diversity of interactions, nestedness, and network specialization did vary within and among years. We also observed that the β-diversity of interactions was high among years and was mostly associated with species turnover (i.e., changes in species composition), with a minor contribution of interaction rewiring (i.e., shifting partner species at different times). Finally, the temporal co-occurrence of hummingbird and plant species among months was the best predictor of the frequency of pairwise interactions, and this pattern was consistent within and among years. Our study underscores the importance of considering the temporal scale to understand how changes in species phenologies, and the resulting temporal co-occurrences influence the structure of interaction networks.

在半干旱环境中，一年中温度和降水的明显对比强烈影响着生态群落。社区中物种的组成及其生态相互作用可能会随着时间的流逝而发生很大变化。尽管经常研究年内变化，但是关于年数和年数之间植物与鸟类关系的结构以及其动因随时间变化的经验信息仍然有限。在这项研究中，我们通过评估物种丰富度，相互作用的多样性，模块性，网络专业化，嵌套性和β的变化，分析了植物-蜂鸟相互作用网络结构的时间动态。墨西哥干燥灌木丛景观中四年的互动多样性。我们还评估了丰度，物候，形态和花蜜糖含量的相对重要性是否能始终如一地解释不同年份植物与蜂鸟之间成对相互作用的频率。我们发现，物种丰富度，相互作用的多样性，嵌套性和网络专业化确实在几年之内和之间有所不同。我们还观察到β-几年间相互作用的多样性很高，并且主要与物种更新（即物种组成的变化）有关，相互作用重新布线的贡献很小（即在不同时间转移伙伴物种）。最后，蜂鸟和植物物种在几个月之间的时间共存是成对相互作用频率的最佳预测指标，并且这种模式在几年内和几年之间是一致的。我们的研究强调了考虑时间尺度以了解物种物候变化以及由此产生的时间共现如何影响相互作用网络结构的重要性。