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Species gain and loss per degree Celsius Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-13 Mark Westoby, Samuel C. Andrew, Rachael V. Gallagher, Julian Schrader
With climate zones moving poleward, it is interesting to know how rapidly species are gained and lost along temperature gradients. For the Australian native vascular flora, observed climate envelopes for species distributions have here been calculated from data for occurrence at geographical locations. For each degree temperature increase along a continental temperature gradient, numbers of species
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Intertidal mussels as ecosystem engineers: maintenance of invertebrate assemblages amid intertidal stress gradients Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-13 David Bogdanski, Lorena Marcos‐Almansa, Augusto A. V. Flores
Species that form complex biogenic structures may increase niche space for many others and are assumed to be paramount for whole‐assemblage stability and ecosystem functioning. Because they often ameliorate physical conditions, ecosystem engineering species are also predicted to become more important with environmental stress. Testing this hypothesis, however, has proven difficult because isolating
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Litter consumption by macrodetritivores depends more on mechanical than on nutritional constraints Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-13 Théo Marchand, Lola Estabes, Benjamin Pey
Ecosystem functions greatly depend on trophic interactions between consumers and their resources. Resource consumption depends on ingestion, digestion, and allocation processes. Mechanical constraints are expected to influence ingestion, while metabolic and nutritional constraints are expected to influence allocation. Leaf litter are resources presenting a high mechanical and nutritional heterogeneity
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Polyploidy‐induced floral changes lead to unexpected pollinator behavior in Arabidopsis arenosa Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-13 Roswitha Schmickl, Mario Vallejo Marín, Jakub Hojka, Juan Manuel Gorospe, Mohammad Javad Haghighatnia, Ömer İltaş, Adam Kantor, Marek Slovák, Clément Lafon Placette
The paradox between the ubiquity of polyploid lineages in plants and the early obstacles to the establishment of polyploids is a long‐studied yet unresolved question in evolutionary biology. It is assumed that to successfully persist after emergence, newly formed polyploids need to display certain fitness advantages and show a certain extent of reproductive isolation with their diploid progenitors
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Plant, insect, and soil microbial communities vary across brome invasion gradients in northern mixed‐grass prairies Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-08 Morgan D. T. Frost, Kimberly J. Komatsu, Lauren M. Porensky, Kurt O. Reinhart, Kevin R. Wilcox, Zachary L. T. Bunch, Ashley D. Jolin, Katielyn A. Johnston, Gracen E. Trimas, Sally E. Koerner
Species interactions shape native plant communities, influencing both composition and ecosystem processes, with invasion by non‐native species threatening these dynamic relationships, native species, and function. The consequences of invasive plants in particular may stretch across taxa to impact plant, insect, and soil microbial communities directly and indirectly, with consequences for ecological
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Height growth and biomass partitioning during secondary succession differ among forest light strata and successional guilds in a tropical rainforest Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-08 Tomonari Matsuo, Frans Bongers, Miguel Martínez‐Ramos, Masha T. van der Sande, Lourens Poorter
In closed‐canopy systems globally, plants exhibit intense competition for light, prioritizing vertical growth to attain elevated positions within the canopy. Light competition is especially intense in tropical rainforests because of their dense shaded stands, and during forest succession because of concomitant changes in vertical light profiles. We evaluated how the height growth of individual tree
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Drying and fragmentation drive the dynamics of resources, consumers and ecosystem functions across aquatic‐terrestrial habitats in a river network Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-27 Romain Sarremejane, Teresa Silverthorn, Angélique Arbaretaz, Amélie Truchy, Nans Barthélémy, Naiara López‐Rojo, Arnaud Foulquier, Laurent Simon, Hervé Pella, Gabriel Singer, Thibault Datry
Rivers form meta‐ecosystems, in which disturbance and connectivity control biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and their interactions across the river network, but also across connected instream and riparian ecosystems. This aquatic–terrestrial linkage is modified by drying, a disturbance that also naturally fragments river networks and thereby modifies organism dispersal and organic matter (OM) transfers
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Sterol limitation of Daphnia on eukaryotic phytoplankton: a combined supplementation and compound‐specific stable isotope labeling approach Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-27 Miikka Benjami Laine, Dominik Martin‐Creuzburg, Jaakko J. Litmanen, Sami J. Taipale
Essential biomolecules can critically influence the performance of consumers. A deficiency in dietary sterols has been shown to constrain the food quality of prokaryotic food sources for aquatic consumers. Here, we assessed the importance of dietary cholesterol for life history traits (survival, growth and egg production) of the freshwater herbivore Daphnia magna in supplementation experiments with
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Flowering synchrony modulates pollinator sharing and places plant individuals along a competition–facilitation continuum Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-27 Blanca Arroyo‐Correa, Ignasi Bartomeus, Pedro Jordano
Indirect interactions among species within ecological communities govern ecological and evolutionary processes as much as, or even more, than direct effects. In insect‐pollinated plant communities, indirect interactions between plants can be mediated by shared pollinators, and may influence plant fitness, population growth and community structure. As individuals are the entities actually interacting
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Plant–mycorrhizal associations may explain the latitudinal gradient of plant community assembly Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-27 Naoto Shinohara, Yuta Kobayashi, Keita Nishizawa, Kohmei Kadowaki, Akira Yamawo
Biogeographical variation in community assembly processes forms the basis of the latitudinal gradient of biodiversity by driving β‐diversity. Classical studies on community assembly predict environmental filtering affecting β‐diversity more strongly at higher latitudes, where productivity is lower and abiotic stress is stronger. Contrary to this prediction, recent evidence indicates that plant community
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Food web complexity modulates environmental impacts on food chain length Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-20 Shota Shibasaki, Akira Terui
The determinants of food chain length (FCL), a crucial aspect of biodiversity due to its effects on ecosystem functioning, have long been debated. Previous studies proposed resource availability, disturbance, and ecosystem size as environmental drivers. However, studies using stable isotope approaches have shown inconsistent results, indicating missing links between environmental drivers and FCL. Here
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Flower-visitor and pollen-load data provide complementary insight into species and individual network roles Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-20 Alyssa R. Cirtwill, Helena Wirta, Riikka Kaartinen, Gavin Ballantyne, Graham N. Stone, Helen Cunnold, Mikko Tiusanen, Tomas Roslin
Most animal pollination results from plant–insect interactions, but how we perceive these interactions may differ with the sampling method adopted. The two most common methods are observations of visits by pollinators to plants and observations of pollen loads carried by insects. Each method could favour the detection of different species and interactions, and pollen load observations typically reveal
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A phylogenetic perspective on ecological specialisation reveals hummingbird and insect pollinators have generalist diets Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-14 María A. Maglianesi, Isabela G. Varassin, Gerardo Ávalos, Leonardo R. Jorge
Specialisation in food resource use is a crucial process that fosters species coexistence in plant–animal networks, contributing to the maintenance of biodiversity, ecological complexity, and community stability. Notably, although there is a vast literature on ecological specialisation in pollination systems, the evolutionary similarity among the plant species visited by particular pollinators has
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Microbe-induced plant resistance alters aphid inter-genotypic competition leading to rapid evolution with consequences for plant growth and aphid abundance Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-12 Xinqiang Xi, Andrew Dean, Sharon E. Zytynska
Plants and insect herbivores are two of the most diverse multicellular groups in the world, and both are strongly influenced by interactions with the belowground soil microbiome. Effects of reciprocal rapid evolution on ecological interactions between herbivores and plants have been repeatedly demonstrated, but it is unknown if (and how) the soil microbiome could mediate these eco-evolutionary processes
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Habitat simplification affects functional group structure along with taxonomic and phylogenetic diversity of temperate-zone ant assemblages over a ten-year period Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-08 G. Pérez-Toledo, M. Cuautle, C. Castillo-Guevara, J. G. Miguelena
Biodiversity is declining at various scales due to habitat simplification. Nevertheless, there is scarce information on how the biotic and abiotic changes linked to simplification affect several diversity dimensions, such as taxonomic, functional, and phylogenetic diversities. This study investigated whether transforming natural oak forests into induced grasslands affected species diversity, functional
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Diversity patterns along ecological succession in tropical dry forests: a multi-taxonomic approach Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-08 Priscila S. Oliveira, Luiz A. D. Falcão, Jarcilene S. Almeida, Geraldo Wilson Fernandes, Ronaldo Reis Júnior, Yule R. F. Nunes, Maria das Dores M. Veloso, Marina do Vale Beirão, Frederico de Siqueira Neves, Ricardo R. C. Solar, Magno A. Z. Borges, Alex C. Silva, Renato P. Salomão, Luciana Iannuzzi, Luciana F. Silva, George A. L. Cabral, Everardo V. S. B. Sampaio, Luiz E. Macedo-Reis, Cleandson F. Santos
Evaluating the diversity of multiple taxa is fundamental to understand community assembly and to assess the integrity and functionality of tropical secondary forests. In this study, we analyzed the natural regeneration of tropical dry forests (TDFs) in three regions of Brazil using Hill–Simpson diversity, abundance and β-diversity of trees and five groups of insects (herbivores, fruit-feeding butterflies
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Geographic and temporal distance–decay relationships across taxa Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-08 Tad A. Dallas, Lauren A. Holian, Cleber Ten Caten
Communities that are farther away from one another in distance or time tend to be more dissimilar. These relationships are often referred to as ‘distance–decay' relationships, relating compositional dissimilarity of communities to geographic distance or exploring compositional shifts through time at a single site. The data required to explore both relationships simultaneously – and their potential
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Density-dependent effects of parasitism on the activity of a benthic engineer species: potential impact on ecosystem functioning Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-08 Annabelle Dairain, Manon Doutrelant, Sarah Bureau, Sébastien Henry, Olivier Maire
While parasitism is a common lifestyle on Earth, its importance for the functioning of marine ecosystems has been overlooked for a long time. In particular, parasites have significant potential to influence central ecological processes through their impacts on hosts that serve as ecosystem engineers. Using an ex situ experimental approach, we explored the effects of trematode parasites on the engineering
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Parasite-mediated changes in host traits alter food web dynamics Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-24 Ines Klemme, Tommi Perälä, Sami O. Lehtinen, Anna Kuparinen
Parasites commonly alter the phenotype of their hosts, thereby influencing competitive and consumer–resource interactions. This could trigger a cascade effect on the dynamics of biological communities, but the role of parasites in ecosystem processes is poorly understood. In this study, we investigate how parasite-induced trait modifications shape the dynamics of a complex lake food web using an allometric
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Beta-diversity buffers fragmented landscapes against local species losses Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-24 Cristian S. Dambros, Thiago Junqueira Izzo, Luciene Castuera de Oliveira, Ricardo Eduardo Vicente, Carlos A. Peres
Agricultural expansion has markedly reduced forests and reconfigured landscapes. These changes incur a well-known detrimental impact on the biodiversity of local forest patches, but the effects on species persistence in entire landscapes comprised of multiple patches are debated. Using data from ants collected in the Amazonian deforestation arc in Brazil, we investigated how regional diversity is affected
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Understanding the complex dynamics of zebra mussel invasions over several decades in European rivers: drivers, impacts and predictions Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-22 Phillip J. Haubrock, Ismael Soto, Melina Kourantidou, Danish A. Ahmed, Ali Serhan Tarkan, Paride Balzani, Kristi Bego, Antonín Kouba, Sadi Aksu, Elizabeta Briski, Francisco Sylvester, Vanessa De Santis, Gaït Archambaud-Suard, Núria Bonada, Miguel Cañedo-Argüelles, Zoltán Csabai, Thibault Datry, Mathieu Floury, Jean-François Fruget, John Iwan Jones, Marie-Helene Lizee, Anthony Maire, John F. Murphy
The zebra mussel Dreissena polymorpha is one of the most successful, notorious, and detrimental aquatic invasive non-native species worldwide, having invaded Europe and North America while causing substantial ecological and socio-economic impacts. Here, we investigated the spatiotemporal trends in this species' invasion success using 178 macroinvertebrate abundance time series, containing 1451 records
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Parasites make hosts more profitable but less available to predators Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-22 Loïc Prosnier, Nicolas Loeuille, Florence D. Hulot, David Renault, Christophe Piscart, Baptiste Bicocchi, Muriel Deparis, Matthieu Lam, Vincent Médoc
Parasites are omnipresent, and their eco-evolutionary significance has aroused much interest from scientists. Parasites may affect their hosts in many ways with changes in density, appearance, behaviour and energy content, likely to modify their value to predators (profitability) within the optimal foraging framework. Consequently, parasites could impact predators' diet and the trophic links through
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Linking intrinsic scales of ecological processes to characteristic scales of biodiversity and functioning patterns Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-22 Yuval R. Zelnik, Matthieu Barbier, David W. Shanafelt, Michel Loreau, Rachel M. Germain
Ecology is a science of scale, which guides our description of both ecological processes and patterns, but we lack a systematic understanding of how process scale and pattern scale are connected. Recent calls for synthesis between population ecology, community ecology, and ecosystem ecology motivate the integration of phenomena at multiple organizational levels. Furthermore, many studies leave out
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Pattern and driver of the compositional variations in a tropical cloud forest: comparing vascular epiphytes with terrestrial woody plants Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-18 Chuchu Xiao, Guang Feng, Wenxing Long
β-diversity patterns (the compositional variations across sites) and their drivers are the major concerns of biodiversity research and conservation practices, whereas such information remains scarce for vascular epiphytes, especially in tropical forest communities. This study aimed to reveal the pattern and driving process of the compositional variations of vascular epiphytes in a tropical cloud forest
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Fertility loss under thermal stress: males have lower fertility limits but no evidence of sex differences in sensitivity Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-18 Jonathan M. Parrett, Marta Kulczak, Natalia Szudarek-Trepto
Climate change models predict that the frequency and intensity of heatwaves are likely to increase, therefore understanding population responses to these extreme climatic events will be key in mitigating biodiversity loss. Here, using the male dimorphic bulb mite, Rhizoglyphus robini, we investigate and compare the impact of experimental heat stress on survival and fertility between females and male
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Recent increasing homogenisation in Austrian butterfly communities over the past decades Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-18 Werner Ulrich, Jan Christian Habel, Patrick Gros, Thomas Schmitt
In Europe, abundance, biomass and species richness of many insect taxa declined during the last decades. This decline might be accompanied by long-term temporal changes in community composition and dominance orders. Here, we use the data base of the natural history museum of Salzburg based on museum records and field books on Austrian butterflies covering the years 1945–2018 and asked 1) whether and
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Invasion success of three cool-season grasses in the northern prairie: a test of three hypotheses Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-17 Cedric Villasor, Kateri Robertson, Thomas Becker, James F. Cahill, Balázs Deák, Isabell Hensen, Rafael Otfinowski, Christoph Rosche, Dariia Borovyk, Tatyana Vakhlamova, Orsolya Valkó, Viktoria Wagner
Empirical invasion ecology is laden with high context dependency. If general mechanisms underlying invasion success exist, they should be detectable in species that share biological and ecological characteristics. We carried out a growth experiment with Agropyron cristatum, Bromus inermis and Poa pratensis (subsp. angustifolia), to better understand the mechanisms underlying the invasion success of
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Dynamic shifts in predator diel activity patterns across landscapes and threat levels Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-17 Matthew W. Rees, Brendan A. Wintle, Jack H. Pascoe, Mark Le Pla, Emma K. Birnbaum, Bronwyn A. Hradsky
Understanding the constraints that dominant predators impose on subordinate species is important for predicting ecosystem dynamics and anticipating outcomes of predator management. Subordinate predators may avoid dominant predators in time or space, making it difficult to quantify antipredator behaviours unless joint spatiotemporal analyses are used. Here, we test whether an invasive dominant predator
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Contrasting responses of fine root biomass and traits to large-scale nitrogen and phosphorus addition in tropical forests in the Guiana shield Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-16 Laynara Figueiredo Lugli, Lucia Fuchslueger, Helena Vallicrosa, Leandro Van Langenhove, Christian Ranits, Pere Roc Fernandez Garberi, Lore Verryckt, Oriol Grau, Laëtitia Bréchet, Guille Peguero, Joan Llusia, Romà Ogaya, Laura Marquez, Miguel Portillo-Estrada, Irene Ramirez-Rojas, Elodie Courtois, Clement Stahl, Jordi Sardans, Josep Penuelas, Erik Verbruggen, Janssens Ivan
Fine roots mediate plant nutrient acquisition and growth. Depending on soil nutrient availability, plants can regulate fine root biomass and morphological traits to optimise nutrient acquisition. Little is known, however, about the importance of these parameters influencing forest functioning. In this study, we measured root responses to nutrient additions to gain a mechanistic understanding of plant
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Understanding polyploid establishment: temporary persistence or stable coexistence? Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-11 Frederik Mortier, Quinten Bafort, Silvija Milosavljevic, Felipe Kauai, Lucas Prost Boxoen, Yves Van de Peer, Dries Bonte
Polyploidy, resulting from whole-genome duplication (WGD), is ubiquitous in nature and reportedly associated with extreme environments and biological invasions. However, WGD usually comes with great costs, raising questions about the establishment chance of newly formed polyploids. The surprisingly high number of polyploid and mixed-ploidy species observed in nature may be a consequence of their continuous
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Divergence in cold tolerance promotes niche differentiation between diploid and polyploid kiwifruits along an altitudinal gradient in Southwest China Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-11 Shi-Jian Yang, Yong-Jiang Zhang, Ya Zhang, Jun-Chu Peng, Cai-Yan Liu, Da-Wei Li, Wen Guo
Polyploidization is hypothesized to improve the freezing resistance of plants in cold regions. However, adaptive strategies and key physiological mechanisms involved in the freezing resistant ability of polyploids remain unclear. In Actinidia chinensis (kiwifruits), the tetraploids and hexaploids occupy higher altitude habitats with colder climates than the diploids, providing a study system to investigate
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Disentangling fine- and large-scale colonization processes in metapopulation dynamics: a case study on a threatened epiphytic bryophyte Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-11 Gwendoline Percel, Christophe Bouget, Marion Gosselin, Yann Dumas, Fabien Laroche
Understanding the colonization process of species living in a dynamic fragmented habitat is essential to assess their persistence. In the metapopulation theory, the colonization of a species can be quantified using the turnover of occupancy in habitat patches. However, this approach is often limited by the feasible size of surveyed areas. Because many species are capable of long-distance dispersal
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Patronus charm: a comparison of benefactor plants and climate mediation effects on diversity Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Christopher J. Lortie, Amanda Liczner, Ally Ruttan, Jenna Braun, Diego A. Sotomayor, Mike Westphal, Rachel King, Alessandro Filazzola
Deserts are subject to significant anthropogenic pressure. The capacity to buffer against changes in the local environment and biodiversity are critical for ecosystem functioning. Foundation species can be a solution to rapidly assess ecological function and provide a simple nature-based solution to protect against continuing biodiversity losses. A foundation species is defined as a species that exerts
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Combining bioenergetics and movement models to improve understanding of the population consequences of disturbance Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Magda Chudzińska, Katarína Klementisová, Cormac Booth, John Harwood
We developed dynamic bioenergetics models to investigate how behavioural responses to anthropogenic disturbance events might affect the population dynamics of three marine mammal species (harbour porpoise, grey seal and harbour seal) with contrasting life-history traits (capital versus income breeders) and movement behaviour (resident versus nomadic). We used these models to analyse how individual
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Chemodiversity affects preference for Tanacetum vulgare chemotypes in two aphid species Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Annika Neuhaus-Harr, Lina Ojeda-Prieto, Elisabeth Eilers, Caroline Müller, Wolfgang W. Weisser, Robin Heinen
Plants of the same species can strongly differ in their specialized metabolite profiles, which can affect insect presence and abundance in the field. However, how specialized chemistry shapes plant attractiveness to herbivorous insects is not fully understood. Here, we used common tansy Tanacetum vulgare, Asteraceae) – a perennial plant that is highly diverse in terpenoid composition and is known to
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The origin of excavator nesting behavior and its impact on the evolution of Neotropical parrots Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Myriam Ramírez-Herranz, Ferran Sayol, Rodrigo S. Rios, Alexandre Antonelli, Francisco A. Squeo
How the origin of novel behaviors can shape the evolutionary trajectory of organisms in response to environmental change remains poorly understood. Birds, especially those with big brains like parrots, are benchmarks for their behavioral innovation capacity in novel environments. Here, we assess whether and how the emergence of open areas in the Neotropics that started in the middle Miocene influenced
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Multiple dimensions of phylogenetic diversity are needed to explain the complex aboveground–belowground diversity relationships Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Xiaorong Lu, Marc W. Cadotte, Pandeng Wang, Shan Rao, Xiaoye Shi, Siyuan Ren, Xihua Wang, Shao-peng Li
The complex relationship between aboveground and belowground diversity and whether they act as surrogates for one another remains unresolved. Increasing evidence suggests that investigating phylogenetic diversity could provide valuable insights into the interplay between plants and soil microbes, but the proliferation of phylogenetic diversity metrics has hindered comparative studies and the identification
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Resilience of tropical invertebrate community assembly processes to a gradient of land use intensity Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Natasha R. Granville, Maxwell V. L. Barclay, Michael J. W. Boyle, Arthur Y. C. Chung, Tom M. Fayle, Huai En Hah, Jane L. Hardwick, Lois Kinneen, Roger L. Kitching, Sarah C. Maunsell, Jeremy A. Miller, Adam C. Sharp, Nigel E. Stork, Leona Wai, Kalsum M. Yusah, Robert M. Ewers
Understanding how community assembly processes drive biodiversity patterns is a central goal of community ecology. While it is generally accepted that ecological communities are assembled by both stochastic and deterministic processes, quantifying their relative importance remains challenging. Few studies have investigated how the relative importance of stochastic and deterministic community assembly
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Integrating several analytical methods to assess strength of ecological processes behind metacommunity assembly Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Ching-Lin Huang, David Zelený, Chia-Hao Chang-Yang
Understanding processes and mechanisms of how species assemble in a metacommunity is crucial for illuminating the factors that contribute to the maintenance of biodiversity and developing management decisions. Ecologists have proposed a number of analytical methods for identifying the effects of various ecological processes, but there is no consensus on the best approach. Our study extends the existing
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Habitat fragmentation through urbanization selects for low dispersal in an ant species Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Basile Finand, Nicolas Loeuille, Céline Bocquet, Pierre Fédérici, Joséphine Ledamoisel, Thibaud Monnin
Increased habitat fragmentation is one of the major global changes affecting biodiversity. It is characterised by a decrease in habitat availability and by the isolation of suitable habitat patches. The dispersal capacities of species may evolve in response to increased habitat fragmentation. Spatial heterogeneities and/or costs of dispersal, which are directly linked to habitat fragmentation, tend
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Direct and higher-order interactions in plant communities under increasing weather persistence Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Simon Reynaert, Jonas J. Lembrechts, Hans J. De Boeck, Chase Donnelly, Lin Zi, Lingjuan Li, Ivan Nijs
Climate change is increasing the weather persistence in the mid-latitudes, prolonging both dry and wet spells compared to historic averages. These newly emerging environmental conditions destabilize plant communities, but the role of species interactions in this process is unknown. Here, we tested how direct and higher-order interactions (HOIs) between species may change in synthesized grassland communities
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The shape of density dependence and the relationship between population growth, intraspecific competition and equilibrium population density Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Emanuel A. Fronhofer, Lynn Govaert, Mary I. O'Connor, Sebastian J. Schreiber, Florian Altermatt
The logistic growth model is one of the most frequently used formalizations of density dependence affecting population growth, persistence and evolution. Ecological and evolutionary theory, and applications to understand population change over time often include this model. However, the assumptions and limitations of this popular model are often not well appreciated. Here, we briefly review past use
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Seasonal soil moisture thresholds inhibit bacterial activity and decomposition during drought in a tallgrass prairie Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Nathan P. Lemoine, Michelle L. Budny, Ethan Rose, Jane Lucas, Christopher W. Marshall
Soil moisture reductions during drought often inhibit soil microbial activity and inhibit decomposition rates by reducing microbial biomass or by altering microbial communities. Evidence suggests that soil water must drop below a critical threshold to inhibit microbial activity. Thus, it is likely that the seasonal timing of drought will determine the extent to which belowground processes are adversely
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Urban spatial heterogeneity shapes the evolution of an antiherbivore defense trait and its genes in white clover Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Tomoki Ishiguro, Marc T. J. Johnson, Shunsuke Utsumi
Urbanization is a global threat to biodiversity due to its large impact on environmental changes. Recently, urban environmental change has been shown to impact the evolution of many species. However, much remains unknown about how urban environments influence evolutionary processes and outcomes due to the non-linearity and discontinuity of environmental variables along urban–rural gradients. Here,
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Variation in the strength of local and regional determinants of herbivory across the Neotropics Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Tara Joy Massad, André Rangel Nascimento, Diego Fernando Campos Moreno, Wilmer Simbaña, Humberto Garcia Lopez, Lidia Sulca, Cintia Lepesqueur, Lora A. Richards, Matthew L. Forister, John O. Stireman, Eric J. Tepe, Kathryn A. Uckele, Laura Braga, Thomas R. Walla, Angela M. Smilanich, Ari Grele, Lee A. Dyer
Insect herbivory can be an important selective pressure and contribute substantially to local plant richness. As herbivory is the result of numerous ecological and evolutionary processes, such as complex insect population dynamics and evolution of plant antiherbivore defenses, it has been difficult to predict variation in herbivory across meaningful spatial scales. In the present work, we characterize
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Fine root presence and increased phosphorus availability stimulate wood decay in a central Amazonian rainforest Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Nathielly P. Martins, Oscar Valverde-Barrantes, Lucia Fuchslueger, Laynara. F. Lugli, Adriana Grandis, Florian Hofhansl, Bruno Takeshi, Gabriela Ushida, Carlos. A. Quesada
In the Amazon basin, approximately 60% of rainforest thrives on geologically old and highly weathered soils, thus decomposition represents an important mechanism for recycling nutrients from organic matter. Although dead logs and branches constitute up to 14% of the carbon stored in terrestrial ecosystems, woody debris decomposition and mainly the effect of direct nutrient cycling by plant root interaction
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Multidimensional trait variability in a widespread, Paleoarctic macrophyte: functional, spectral and genetic drivers Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Alice Dalla Vecchia, Andrea Coppi, Maria Beatrice Castellani, Lorenzo Lastrucci, Erika Piaser, Paolo Villa, Rossano Bolpagni
Understanding how environmental conditions and plant functional variation are mutually related is critical to improving our comprehension of plant adaptations. In this context, our knowledge of the interlinks between plant functional, spectral and genetic traits and environmental filters is still very limited, especially for wetland species. To gain new insights on this topic, a multidimensional dataset
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Assisted migration in a warmer and drier climate: less climate buffering capacity, less facilitation and more fires at temperate latitudes? Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Richard Michalet, Christopher Carcaillet, Florian Delerue, Jean-Christophe Domec, Jonathan Lenoir
Assisted tree migration has been proposed as a conceptual solution to mitigate lags in biotic responses to anthropogenic climate change. The rationale behind this concept is that tree species currently growing under warmer and drier climates will be more resistant and resilient to the new climatic conditions than tree species naturally growing in currently wetter and colder climates. However, we hypothesize
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Warming had contrasting effects on the importance of facilitative interactions with a cushion nurse species on native and non-native species in the high-Andes of central Chile Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Lohengrin A. Cavieres, Carolina E. Sanhueza, Carolina Hernández-Fuentes
Alpine habitats are regarded as particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. On one hand, global warming is supposed to contributes to alpine environments becoming less stressful. On the other hand, altered snowpack due to warmer temperatures can intensify the stress in these habitats. The presence of non-native plants on some of these habitats is due to the facilitative effects exerted
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Availability of mates and food influence the plasticity in strategies mediating life-history tradeoffs in an insect Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Zachary R. Stahlschmidt, Daniel Bui, Jessica Chen, William Zhao
Different life-history strategies can be employed to navigate the tradeoff between investment into reproductive and somatic tissues, and plasticity in life-history strategies may be one of animals' most important tools to counter ongoing global change. Therefore, we factorially manipulated the availability of two critical resources – mates and food – to determine plasticity in life-history investment
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Abiotic and biotic contexts shape the effect of disturbance on non-native plant invasion Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Mariana C. Chiuffo, José L. Hierro
Making predictions about when and where a given mechanism of invasion will be weak or strong is crucial for the effective management of non-native species. Despite the importance of disturbance on invasion, our understanding of how variation in abiotic and/or biotic conditions may modify the disturbance-invasion relationship is scarce. Here, we aimed to evaluate how abiotic (soil type) and biotic (tree
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Correlation of plasticities to drought and shade: implications for environmental niche overlap in drylands Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-19 Víctor M. Escobedo, Rodrigo S. Rios, Cristian Salgado-Luarte, Ernesto Gianoli
Phenotypic plasticity can increase the extent of the environmental gradient occupied by a species (niche breadth) and modify the portion of niche space shared among co-occurring species (niche overlap). Thus, phenotypic plasticity may play a role in community assembly processes. Given that plants deal with a multivariate environment, and that functional traits are often correlated, plastic responses
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Spread your wings: insect–plant–landscape interactions mediate the wing shape of a multivoltine polyphagous insect Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-14 Amanda F. P. Machado, Nícholas F. Camargo, Natália B. de Souza, Erich Y. T. Nakasu, Alice K. Inoue-Nagata, Pedro H. B. Togni
Wing morphology may affect the foraging efficiency of polyphagous insects via effects on their flight ability. Variations in wing morphology may be triggered by host plant quality, while landscape composition can also play a role in filtering the ability of variants to colonize new habitats. We investigated how intraspecific variations in wing morphology in a polyphagous insect are mediated by the
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Decomposability of leaf and wood litter are not correlated across species: effects of litter traits on decomposition in field and laboratory conditions Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-14 Takuya Kobayashi, Michio Oguro, Hisatomo Taki, Hiroko Kurokawa
Changes in tree species composition have important effects on the overall rate of litter decomposition at a community level because litter decomposability varies among species and between leaf and wood litter. To understand how changes in tree species composition affect litter dynamics and carbon sequestration at the ecosystem level, it is important to clarify interspecific variations in leaf and wood
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Evolution of dispersal and the maintenance of fragmented metapopulations Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-05 Basile Finand, Thibaud Monnin, Nicolas Loeuille
Because it affects dispersal risk and modifies competition levels, habitat fragmentation directly constrains dispersal evolution. When dispersal is traded off against competitive ability, increased fragmentation is often expected to select higher dispersal. Such evolutionary effects could favor the maintenance of the metapopulation by fostering spatial rescue effects. Using an evolutionary model, we
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Threshold-dependent gene regulation and partial assortative mating determine wing dimorphism of an insect Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-05 Meng-Sha Mao, Yi-Nan He, Xiang-Dong Liu
Wing dimorphism is a life-historical trait of insects which indicates the developmental trend of populations, going as migrants or staying as residents. The alternative wing morph enhances adaptability of insects to changing environments. However, the underlying mechanism for maintaining wing dimorphism remains vague. The brown planthoppers Nilaparvata lugens, a serious pest of rice, are either short-winged
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Diversity–functioning relationships across hierarchies of biological organization Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-05 Sarah Mayor, Eric Allan, Florian Altermatt, Forest Isbell, Michael E. Schaepman, Bernhard Schmid, Pascal A. Niklaus
Numerous biodiversity–ecosystem functioning (BEF) experiments have shown that plant community productivity typically increases with species diversity. In these studies, diversity is generally quantified using metrics of taxonomic, phylogenetic, or functional differences among community members. Research has also shown that the relationships between species diversity and functioning depends on the spatial
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Leaf trait variation within individuals mediates the relationship between tree species richness and productivity Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-05 Tobias Proß, Sylvia Haider, Harald Auge, Helge Bruelheide
In forest ecosystems, many ecosystem functions such as tree growth are affected by tree species richness. This biodiversity–productivity relationship (BPR) is mediated by leaf traits, which themselves are known to be influenced by tree species richness; at the same time, as the primary organs of light capture, they are an important factor for tree growth. However, how tree growth is influenced by a
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Cross-scale facilitation: a framework for microclimate moderation of climate change Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-11-22 Laurel M. Brigham, Katharine N. Suding
There is widespread evidence that plants can facilitate associated species through microclimate moderation. These effects can act locally, by increasing vital rates via direct effects on the conditions experienced by the beneficiary, or at the landscape scale, by enhancing population persistence via environmental heterogeneity and connectivity. Despite linkages between microclimate moderation and the
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Adaptive differentiation on serpentine soil in diploid versus autotetraploid populations of Biscutella laevigata (Brassicaceae) Oikos (IF 3.4) Pub Date : 2023-11-16 Tala Bürki, Valentin Pulver, Sandra Grünig, Martin Čertner, Christian Parisod
Serpentine soils exhibit extreme properties (e.g. high magnesium content) influencing plant growth and survival, and have been repeatedly documented to promote adaptive edaphic differentiation in plants. Individuals from four pairs of nearby diploid and autotetraploid populations of Biscutella laevigata sampled on serpentine versus non-serpentine soils in a factorial design are used to assess the genetic