Abstract Climate change is drastically altering environmental conditions and resource availability. Many organisms are shifting their distribution boundaries. Fiddler crabs, for instance, are important ecosystem engineers in coastal environments that have been extending their distribution range poleward. In this study, we evaluated the influence of a range-extending species, Leptuca cumulanta, which has recently overlapped the distribution of the resident species Leptuca uruguayensis. Through a set of field and laboratory experiments, we characterised the degree of territorial overlap between L. cumulanta and L. uruguayensis from the lower to upper intertidal zone in a mangrove area. We also analysed whether the presence of L. cumulanta prevents habitat choosiness or influences agonistic behaviours in L. uruguayensis in territorial fights. We found that both species overlap territories at the same level in the intertidal zone. However, we observed that both habitat choice and agonistic behaviours of L. uruguayensis were unresponsive to the presence of L. cumulanta. The low interference between recent heterospecific neighbours sharing the same space supports coexistence of fiddler crabs L. uruguayensis and L. cumulanta in the early stage of overlapping.

中文翻译：

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边界之战：范围扩展的招潮蟹是否会影响同类物种的空间生态位？

摘要 气候变化正在极大地改变环境条件和资源可用性。许多生物正在改变它们的分布边界。例如，招潮蟹是沿海环境中重要的生态系统工程师，它们的分布范围一直在向极地扩展。在这项研究中，我们评估了范围扩展物种 Leptuca cumulanta 的影响，该物种最近与常驻物种 Leptuca uruguayensis 的分布重叠。通过一组野外和实验室实验，我们表征了红树林地区从低潮间带到高潮间带的 L. cumulanta 和 L. uruguayensis 之间的领土重叠程度。我们还分析了 L. cumulanta 的存在是否会阻止栖息地选择或影响 L. uruguayensis 在领土斗争中的对抗行为。我们发现这两个物种在潮间带的同一水平上重叠了领土。然而，我们观察到 L. uruguayensis 的栖息地选择和激动行为对 L. cumulanta 的存在没有反应。最近共享同一空间的异种邻居之间的低干扰支持招潮蟹 L. uruguayensis 和 L. cumulanta 在重叠的早期共存。