Diversity of plant evolutionary lineages promotes arthropod diversity

Large‐scale habitat destruction and climate change result in the non‐random loss of evolutionary lineages, reducing the amount of evolutionary history represented in ecological communities. Yet, we have limited understanding of the consequences of evolutionary history on the structure of food webs a...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ecology letters 2012-11, Vol.15 (11), p.1308-1317
Main Authors: Dinnage, Russell, Cadotte, Marc W., Haddad, Nick M., Crutsinger, Gregory M., Tilman, David
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Abundance
Animal and plant ecology
Animal, plant and microbial ecology
Animals
Arthropoda
Arthropods
Biodiversity
biodiversity experiments
Biological and medical sciences
Biological Evolution
Climate change
community ecology
Conservation of Natural Resources
ecosystem function
Evolutionary biology
Food Chain
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
General aspects
Habitats
phylogenetic diversity
Phylogenetics
Phylogeny
Plant ecology
Plants
trophic levels
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Summary:Large‐scale habitat destruction and climate change result in the non‐random loss of evolutionary lineages, reducing the amount of evolutionary history represented in ecological communities. Yet, we have limited understanding of the consequences of evolutionary history on the structure of food webs and the services provided by biological communities. Drawing on 11 years of data from a long‐term plant diversity experiment, we show that evolutionary history of plant communities – measured as phylogenetic diversity – strongly predicts diversity and abundance of herbivorous and predatory arthropods. Effects of plant species richness on arthropods become stronger when phylogenetic diversity is high. Plant phylogenetic diversity explains predator and parasitoid richness as strongly as it does herbivore richness. Our findings indicate that accounting for evolutionary relationships is critical to understanding the severity of species loss for food webs and ecosystems, and for developing conservation and restoration policies.
ISSN:1461-023X
1461-0248
DOI:10.1111/j.1461-0248.2012.01854.x