I collected 158 published data sets with information on community structure, environmental and spatial variables. We argue that a dispersalcentered synthesis of metacommunity ecology. Holyoak, marcel until recently community ecologya science devoted to understanding the patterns and processes of species distribution and abundancefocused mainly on specific and often limited scales of a single community. Ecological community an overview sciencedirect topics.
Metacommunity structure influences the stability of local beetle communities pdf. View enhanced pdf access article on wiley online library html view download pdf for offline viewing. Metacommunities takes the hallmarks of metapopulation theory to the next level by considering a group of communities, each of which may contain numerous populations, connected by species interactions within communities and the movement of individuals between communities. Four metacommunity perspectives have been proposed. Metacommunity patterns and underlying processes in aquatic organisms have typically been studied within a drainage basin. Until recently community ecology a science devoted to understanding the patterns and processes of species distribution and abundance focused mainly on. Tracking environmental change at different spatial scales mathew a. Hydrology affects environmental and spatial structuring of. In affected areas a community of interacting organisms may be fragmented into a network of smaller patches connected through dispersal of individuals of the different species. School of biological sciences flinders university gpo box 2100 adelaide, south australia 5001.
Adaptive and coadaptive dynamics in metacommunities. Here we argue for a greater emphasis on the interplay between evolution in spatially structured populations and ecological dynamics in spatially structured communities termed metacommunities. Spatial structures of the environment and of dispersal. In examining communities open to dispersal, the book unites a broad range. These models build on existing work on spatial community dynamics and are a starting point for considering the possibilities for how spatial dynamics might function. The size of a metacommunity, or number of patches, is predicted to influence community dynamics and therefore the structure and function of local communities. Metacommunity ecology combines the importance of local factors environmental conditions. Spatial dynamics and ecological communities 9780226350646. Spatial dynamic and a great selection of related books, art and collectibles available now at.
The evolutionary ecology of metacommunities sciencedirect. Metacommunity theory provides a framework for assessing the role of spatial and environmental processes in structuring ecological communities and places emphasis on the role of dispersal. The temporal dynamics of ecological communities are inherently complex, as dispersal processes, interspecific biotic interactions and environmental fluctuations interact to shape species assemblages. We hypothesized h2 that a model based on environmental, spatial and temporal dynamics would be able to predict the community similarities of nematodes in a distinct but geographically proximate. Across more connected communities, spatial effects diminished over succes.
The metacommunity concept incorporates spatial dynamics into community ecology, shedding light on how local and regional processes interact in structuring ecological communities, and to which. Metacommunities provide a framework to understand the scale dependence of dominance and to highlight important controlling factors of dominance such as ecological interactions, dispersal, and species sorting. Riverine ecosystems, however, have been for a long time viewed from a local or linear perspective, even though the treelike branching of river networks is universal. However, metacommunity dynamics are not yet described to their full extent. An ecological metacommunity is a set of interacting communities which are linked by the dispersal of multiple, potentially interacting species. Spatial dynamics and ecological communities abebooks. Due to the destruction of their habitat some organisms have an uneven distribution across the landscape. Interspecific interactions in patchy, subdivided habitats. Leibold is associate professor of integrative biology at the university. Metacommunities has four main sections including core concepts, empirical evidence, theoretical. Factors controlling community structure in heterogeneous. However, recent work demonstrates that dispersal can drastically alter the interplay between ecological and evolutionary dynamics, often in unexpected ways.
In examining communities open to dispersal, the book unites a broad range of ecological theories, presenting some of the first empirical investigations and revealing the value of the metacommunity approach. Habitat fragmentation and dispersal corridors affect. Metacommunity theory provides a framework for assessing the role of spatial and environmental processes in structuring ecological communities and places emphasis on the role of. Spatial and environmental processes show temporal variation in the structuring of waterbird metacommunities. Environmental processes and dispersal are primary determinants of metacommunity dynamics.
Pdf on dec 1, 2006, hans henrik bruun and others published meta communities. Research on the interactions between evolutionary and ecological dynamics has largely focused on local spatial scales and on relatively simple ecological communities. School of biological sciences flinders university gpo box 2100 adelaide, south australia 5001 australia email. According to metacommunity theory, community assembly processes can follow a neutral model or be explained by differences among species related mainly to the adaptation to local environmental factors and to differential dispersal abilities 12. Marcel holyoakis associate professor of environmental science and policy at the university of california, davis. Until recently community ecologya science devoted to understanding the patterns and processes of species distribution and abundancefocused mainly on specific and often limited scales of a single community. I collected 158 published data sets with information on community structure, environmental and spatial. The term is derived from the field of community ecology, which is primarily concerned with patterns of species distribution, abundance and interactions.
From metacommunities to metaecosystems michel loreau, nicolas mouquet, and robert d. Colonization and extinction rates estimated from temporal. This book is a resoundingly thorough exploration of metacommunity concepts to date. These metacommunities can be modelled with explicit dynamics and spatial structure, with dependence on both local. The collection of empirical, theoretical, and synthetic chapters in metacommunities seeks to understand how communities work in fragmented landscapes.
In these metacommunities, the relative importance of local environmental and regional spatial processes is currently hotly debated, especially in terms of the validity of neutral model. The influence of spatial processes on diversity and community dynamics is generally recognized in ecology and also applied to conservation projects involving forest and grassland ecosystems. Metacommunity dynamics ecology oxford bibliographies. This is because joint evolutionary and dispersal dynamics can shape the species composition and diversity of natural communities 6, 7, 8. Abstract assembly and dynamics in multispecies communities have long attracted the interest of ecologists.
Predatorprey interactions in spatially complex habitats. The relative importance of these effects may vary between species of different abundance classes, given variation in life history traits. In nonneutral communities, ecological drift is acting along with deterministic processes to determine the species distribution 45,48,49. In that sense, geographical spatial extent of observation would partly explain biodiversity distribution 34. Local and regional community dynamics in fragmented landscapes. Ecological communities are not isolated, but connected via dispersal, which links local communities into metacommunities. To gain a general understanding of how the environmental correlation structure might affect spatial community dynamics, i consider three different metacommunity types with different betweenspecies interaction patterns. Spatial dynamics and ecological communities, edited by marcel holyoak, mathew a. This edited book is the first that is totally devoted to the subject of metacommunity dynamics. Spatial dynamics community ecology wiley online library. We examined variation in the composition of six freshwater organismal groups across various drainage basins in finland. We first modelled spatial structures within each drainage basin using moran eigenvector maps. Thinking about metacommunities often starts with four conceptual models, termed patch dynamics, neutral community dynamics, species sorting and mass effects leibold et al.
Integrating environmental and spatial processes in. Holt and marcel holyoak food web dynamics in a metacommunity context. Holt represents a specific, individual, material embodiment of a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in brigham young university. When connectivity was disrupted, space was the dominant factor underlying beta diversity, and this did not change over time. Since the 1970s, for example, metapopulation dynamics studies of interacting groups of populations connected through movementconcentrated on the processes of population turnover. We also demonstrate the importance of both local and spatial processes when examining the temporal stability of primary production at the scale of.
Metacommunities spatial dynamics and ecological communities edited by marcel holyoak, mathew a. Under high disturbance conditions, rare species may be more easily eliminated from their optimal habitats and their distribution may therefore be more heavily. Contrasting roles of environmental and spatial processes. Specifically, habitat selection responses to top predators during. Ecological drift is an emergent property of community dynamics affecting species distribution and is the driver underlying species abundance distributions in the neutral theory 32,46,47. We developed an r package, island a community ecology tool to analyse temporal patterns and explore potential drivers of community dynamics. Nonconsumptive effects of predators are increasingly recognized as important drivers of community assembly and structure. Dynamics of ecological communities in variable environments local. Encouraging community ecologists to rethink some of the leading theories of population and community dynamics, metacommunities urges ecologists to expand the spatiotemporal scales of their research.
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