Different in the dark: The effect of habitat characteristics on community composition and beta diversity in bromeliad microfauna

Autor(es)

Busse, Annika ^{[1, 2]} ; Antiqueira, Pablo A. P. ^{[3, 4]} ; Neutzling, Alexandre S. ^[3] ; Wolf, Anna M. ^[5] ; Romero, Gustavo Q. ^[4] ; Petermann, Jana S. ^{[1, 2]}

Afiliação do(s) autor(es)

^[1] Berlin Brandenburg Inst Adv Biodivers Res BBIB, Berlin - Germany

^[2] Univ Salzburg, Dept Biosci, Salzburg - Austria

^[3] Univ Campinas UNICAMP, Inst Biol, Grad Program Ecol, Campinas, SP - Brazil

^[4] Univ Campinas UNICAMP, Inst Biol, Dept Anim Biol, Multitroph Interact & Biodivers Lab, Campinas, SP - Brazil

^[5] Free Univ Berlin, Inst Biol, Berlin - Germany

• Tipo de documento: Artigo Científico
• Fonte: PLoS One; v. 13, n. 2 FEB 5 2018.
• Citações Web of Science: 3

Resumo

The mechanisms which structure communities have been the focus of a large body of research. Here, we address the question if habitat characteristics describing habitat quality may drive changes in community composition and beta diversity of bromeliad-inhabiting microfauna. In our system, changes in canopy cover along an environmental gradient may affect resource availability, disturbance in form of daily water temperature fluctuations and predation, and thus may lead to changes in community structure of bromeliad microfauna through differences in habitat quality along this gradient. Indeed, we observed distinct changes in microfauna community composition along the environmental gradient explained by changes in the extent of daily water temperature fluctuations. We found beta diversity to be higher under low habitat quality (low canopy cover) than under high habitat quality (high canopy cover), which could potentially be explained by a higher relative importance of stochastic processes under low habitat quality. We also partitioned beta diversity into turnover and nestedness components and we found a nested pattern of beta diversity along the environmental gradient, with communities from the lower-quality habitat being nested subsets of communities from the higher-quality habitat. However, this pattern resulted from an increase in microfauna alpha diversity with an increase in habitat quality. By providing insights into microfauna-environment relationships our results contribute to the mechanistic understanding of community dynamics in small freshwater bodies. Here, we highlight the importance of habitat characteristics representing habitat quality in structuring communities, and suggest that this information may help to improve conservation practices of small freshwater ecosystems. (AU)

• Processo FAPESP: 14/04603-4 - Efeitos do aquecimento global na estrutura trófica e no funcionamento ecossistêmico em bromélias-tanque
• Beneficiário: Pablo Augusto Poleto Antiqueira
• Linha de fomento: Bolsas no Brasil - Doutorado