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Ecological drivers of fish metacommunities: Environmental and spatial factors surpass predation in structuring metacommunities of intermittent rivers
Author(s) -
Faustino de Queiroz Amanda Caroline,
Terra Bianca de Freitas
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
ecology of freshwater fish
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.667
H-Index - 55
eISSN - 1600-0633
pISSN - 0906-6691
DOI - 10.1111/eff.12502
Subject(s) - metacommunity , ecology , biological dispersal , predation , structuring , fish <actinopterygii> , community , biology , ecosystem , fishery , population , demography , finance , sociology , economics
Metacommunity theory is a new approach for explaining how local and regional processes contribute to community organisation and integrative studies are needed to fully characterise the processes underlying its structure and function. We analysed, through variation partitioning and distance decay relationships, how metacommunities of fish in pools of intermittent rivers are structured by environmental, species interaction and spatial factors. The results indicate that both species sorting and dispersal limitation (spatial factors) were important in shaping fish metacommunities. Species sorting was the most influential driver within fish metacommunities, but predation was much less relevant and did not show any pure effect in metacommunity structure. However, environmental factors were determinant among metacommunity patches.