Multitrophic diversity in a biodiverse forest is highly nonlinear across spatial scales

Andreas Schuldt (), Tesfaye Wubet, François Buscot, Michael Staab, Thorsten Assmann, Martin Böhnke-Kammerlander, Sabine Both, Alexandra Erfmeier, Alexandra-Maria Klein, Keping Ma, Katherina Pietsch, Sabrina Schultze, Christian Wirth, Jiayong Zhang, Pascale Zumstein and Helge Bruelheide
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Andreas Schuldt: Institute of Ecology, Leuphana University Lüneburg
Tesfaye Wubet: UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research
François Buscot: UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research
Michael Staab: Institute of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Freiburg
Thorsten Assmann: Institute of Ecology, Leuphana University Lüneburg
Martin Böhnke-Kammerlander: Institute of Biology/Geobotany and Botanical Garden, University of Halle
Sabine Both: Institute of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Aberdeen
Alexandra Erfmeier: German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig
Alexandra-Maria Klein: Institute of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Freiburg
Keping Ma: Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Katherina Pietsch: Systematic Botany and Functional Biodiversity, University of Leipzig
Sabrina Schultze: Institute of Ecology, Leuphana University Lüneburg
Christian Wirth: German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig
Jiayong Zhang: Institute of Ecology, Zhejiang Normal University
Pascale Zumstein: Institute of Ecology, Leuphana University Lüneburg
Helge Bruelheide: German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig

Nature Communications, 2015, vol. 6, issue 1, 1-8

Abstract: Abstract Subtropical and tropical forests are biodiversity hotspots, and untangling the spatial scaling of their diversity is fundamental for understanding global species richness and conserving biodiversity essential to human well-being. However, scale-dependent diversity distributions among coexisting taxa remain poorly understood for heterogeneous environments in biodiverse regions. We show that diversity relations among 43 taxa—including plants, arthropods and microorganisms—in a mountainous subtropical forest are highly nonlinear across spatial scales. Taxon-specific differences in β-diversity cause under- or overestimation of overall diversity by up to 50% when using surrogate taxa such as plants. Similar relationships may apply to half of all (sub)tropical forests—including major biodiversity hotspots—where high environmental heterogeneity causes high biodiversity and species turnover. Our study highlights that our general understanding of biodiversity patterns has to be improved—and that much larger areas will be required than in better-studied lowland forests—to reliably estimate biodiversity distributions and devise conservation strategies for the world’s biodiverse regions.

Date: 2015
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DOI: 10.1038/ncomms10169

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