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Ant diversity partitioning across spatial scales: Ecological processes and implications for conserving T ropical D ry F orests
Author(s) -
Marques Tatianne,
Schoereder José H.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
austral ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.688
H-Index - 87
eISSN - 1442-9993
pISSN - 1442-9985
DOI - 10.1111/aec.12046
Subject(s) - species richness , ecology , null model , vegetation (pathology) , spatial distribution , spatial ecology , scale (ratio) , sampling (signal processing) , ecoregion , beta diversity , species diversity , geography , biology , cartography , remote sensing , medicine , pathology , filter (signal processing) , computer science , computer vision
Several ecological and evolutionary processes can drive changes in diversity at different spatial scales. To determine the scale at which these processes are most influential, we hypothesized that (i) broad‐scale differences between ecoregions had greater influence on ant species richness and species turnover than local differences among fragments within ecoregions; and (ii) the degree of dissimilarity in ant species composition is larger between T ropical D ry F orest fragments and the surrounding vegetations than among T ropical D ry F orests located in different ecoregions, indicating that extant T ropical D ry F orests are relicts of a broader distribution of this vegetation. To examine ant diversity patterns, we built a nested hierarchical design on three spatial scales, ranging from fragments (local scale), T ropical D ry F orest + surroundings vegetation (landscape scale) and B razilian ecoregions (regional scale). We used 450 sampling units (45 sampling units × two fragments × five ecoregions = 450). A null model based on the sample was used to identify variations in the random distribution across spatial scales. Spatial partitioning of ant diversity showed that observed β 1 diversity (between fragments) and β 2 diversity (among ecoregions) were higher than expected by chance. When the partitioning was analysed separately for each region, the observed β 1 diversity ( T ropical D ry F orest and surrounding vegetation) was higher than expected by the null hypothesis in all ecoregions of B razil. Based on species composition and diversity patterns, we stress the importance of creating more protected areas throughout the coverage area of T ropical D ry F orests, favouring a more efficient conservation process.