Interactive effects of species richness and species traits on functional diversity and redundancy |
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Authors: | Fredrik Dalerum Elissa Z Cameron Kyran Kunkel Michael J Somers |
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Institution: | (1) Centre for Wildlife Management, Hatfield Experimental Farm, University of Pretoria, 0002 Pretoria, South Africa;(2) Mammal Research Institute, Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria, 0002 Pretoria, South Africa;(3) Present address: School of Zoology, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia;(4) Centre for Invasion Biology, University of Pretoria, 0002 Pretoria, South Africa;(5) WWF, Bozeman, MT, USA |
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Abstract: | The importance of species diversity for ecosystem function has emerged as a key question for conservation biology. Recently,
there has been a shift from examining the role of species richness in isolation towards understanding how species interact
to effect ecosystem function. Here, we briefly review theoretical predictions regarding species contributions to functional
diversity and redundancy and further use simulated data to test combined effects of species richness, number of functional
traits, and species differences within these traits on unique species contributions to functional diversity and redundancy,
as well as on the overall functional diversity and redundancy within species assemblages. Our results highlighted that species
richness and species functional attributes interact in their effects on functional diversity. Moreover, our simulations suggested
that functional differences among species have limited effects on the proportion of redundancy of species contributions as
well as on the overall redundancy within species assemblages, but that redundancy rather was determined by number of traits
and species richness. Our simulations finally indicated scale dependence in the relative effects of species richness and functional
attributes, which suggest that the relative influence of these factors may affect individual contributions differently compared
to the overall ecosystem function of species assemblages. We suggest that studies on the relationship between biological diversity
and ecosystem function will benefit from focusing on multiple processes and ecological interactions, and that the relative
functional attributes of species will have pivotal roles for the ecosystem function of a given species assembly. |
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