Ecology Letters最新文献

Allometry, the scaling of traits or biological rates with body mass, is central to a wide range of ecological research including dynamic food web modelling. There has been extensive focus on exponents (3/4 scaling laws), but little on the coefficients (normalisation constants). Coefficients that have been used since 2006 are derived from limited data and dated methodologies. Here, we compiled a data set of over 1000 genera with body mass spanning 10 orders of magnitude. We updated metabolism and production coefficients, deriving new genus and metabolic group levels estimates with phylogenetic hierarchical modelling providing robust inference. Our coefficients were mostly lower than those previously estimated, with increased uncertainty estimates. We used the Bioenergetic Food Web Model to evaluate their impact, finding increased biomass and species persistence but no change in stability. Our coefficients pave the way for future simulations that take advantage of subsets of genus and metabolic group data.

Understanding why some viable body forms never evolve can reveal how ecological and evolutionary forces shape biodiversity. We investigate this question in the Passeroidea, a large group of songbirds, by analysing their morphological trait space using topological data analysis and ancestral state reconstruction. We identify a persistent morphological gap densely surrounded by extant species but unoccupied throughout passeroid diversification. The gap patterns deviate from stochastic expectations and show no evidence of past occupation, rendering undirected trait evolution and extinction unlikely. Similar morphologies exist in other bird lineages, ruling out intrinsic constraints or niche absence. Geographic distributions and traits of passeroids versus non-passeroid gap occupants point to competitive exclusion as the plausible explanation: early-colonising territorial specialists outside the Passeroidea may have preemptively occupied key habitats, limiting evolutionary opportunities for later-arriving lineages. We demonstrate how historical contingency can shape macroevolutionary outcomes and introduce a generalizable framework for investigating structural gaps in trait evolution.

Effects of climate change on phenological timing, like flowering onset, are crucial for population fitness and community dynamics. Recent research has focused on plastic responses to earlier springs, but the optimal phenological timing should depend also on the growing season duration, within which entire annual life cycles must unfold. Optimal energy allocation theory can address life-history scheduling when this critical time window expands. Extending Iwasa and Cohen's (1989) framework, we predict a nonlinear relationship between growing season length and optimal flowering time of deciduous perennial plants measured from spring onset. Common-garden experiments with purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria) and European goldenrod (Solidago virgaurea) along Swedish latitudinal gradients strongly supported this a priori prediction. As climate change alters both start and duration of growing seasons, our finding suggests that optimal flowering time expressed as calendar day could stall before accelerating its advancement in response to climate warming at current high-latitude range margins.

Emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) threaten biodiversity, yet identifying key host species in complex ecological communities remains a major challenge. Here, we develop a quantitative framework combining field data, epidemiological modelling, simulations, and Bayesian inference to pinpoint key viral hosts in multispecies bee communities. Using flower–visitor interaction data and molecular virus screening, we estimate species-specific basic reproduction numbers (R₀) and assess the role of both key hosts and community metrics in virus transmission and persistence. We show that, while honeybees often act as primary reservoirs for deformed wing virus and black queen cell virus, others, such as the bumblebee Bombus lapidarius, can drive the spread of acute bee paralysis virus. Viral dynamics are primarily explained by exposure to key hosts, while community effects are not as pronounced. Identification of non-honeybee key hosts challenges existing assumptions and highlights drivers of transmission and pathogen persistence in complex host–pathogen networks.

Global warming is raising both climate and weather variability. However, how this tendency may destabilise forest ecosystems is poorly understood. Using a set of global tree-ring data, we calculated the 5-year variance and mean of tree growth rate over 1401–2010, and modelled the variance–mean relationship. We found that the global averaged variance increased much faster than the mean in the past century (+40.0% vs. +8.5%), and closely covaried with the accelerated global warming since the 1970s (r = 0.93). The exponent of tree-level variance–mean power law was higher in wetter habitats and less drought-resistant species, and has increased significantly under global warming, indicating an environment- and trait-dependent growth-safety tradeoff and a decreasing resistance to a warmer climate. Our study shows that global warming may have strongly destabilised tree growth and made forest dynamics less predictable, adding to the growing concern that global warming is jeopardising the functioning of forest ecosystems.

Reliable predictions of species responses to intensifying temperature extremes are crucial for managing climate change impacts. However, limited data of species' responses to heat stress across their distribution restricts prediction accuracy. Here we analyse three-decades of kelp abundance observations in Australia, including cool to warm-edge populations, relative to marine heatwaves (MHWs). As MHWs intensified, changes in kelp abundances shifted from positive to negative. Warm-edge populations displayed steeper declines in abundance change than central and cool-edge populations under comparable MHWs. Our results support a hybrid thermal performance model, whereby thermal limits differ between populations, but performance volatility increases toward species' warm-edge, heightening vulnerability of warm-edge populations. Importantly, realised impacts of MHWs were evident at smaller thermal anomalies than predicted by experiments and distribution models, highlighting the importance of calibrating theoretical approaches with realised ecological change. By integrating a multi-faceted approach, our study is generalisable for improving predictions of species' population vulnerability.