Austral Ecology最新文献

Morgan, J. W., L. Gilfedder, K. L. McDougall, R. J.-P. Davies, M. A. Robertson, and R. Rehwinkel. 2025. “Why Conservation of Australian Native Temperate Grasslands Needs to Occur at Different Scales—From Landscapes to Patches, and From Governments to Individuals.” Austral Ecology 50, no. 10: e70131. https://doi.org/10.1111/aec.70131.

The FIGURE 3 caption ‘An example of a State and Transition Model developed for the Northern Plains grasslands of Victoria subjected to land use by livestock grazing, pasture improvement, and/or cropping. Note the seven vegetation states (the boxes) represent vegetation changes from ‘reference’ native grasslands (at the time of European colonisation, State 1)—ecosystems that were characterised by low soil nutrient status and low soil disturbance and maintained by light marsupial grazing and/or fire—all the way through to exotic ecosystems (dominated by cereal crops) where soil nutrients and soil disturbance are high; it is these inputs that maintain a non-native state at the expense of native species. The transitions (connecting arrows) represent the purported mechanism for grassland change, and whether those changes are thought to be reversible (i.e., an earlier vegetation state can be achieved with changes in disturbance, soil nutrients and ecological processes). Similar trajectories occur in other native grassland regions with land use, (e.g., see Sinclair et al. 2019) for a state and transition approach to vegetation change on the Victorian Volcanic Plains’ omitted an important reference to a similar, published State and Transition Model.

The new caption for FIGURE 3 should read ‘An example of a State and Transition Model developed for the Northern Plains grasslands of Victoria subjected to land use by livestock grazing, pasture improvement and/or cropping. Adapted from McIntyre and Lavorel (2007, Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 119, 11–21). Note the seven vegetation states (the boxes) represent vegetation changes from ‘reference’ native grasslands (at the time of European colonisation, State 1)—ecosystems that were characterised by low soil nutrient status and low soil disturbance and maintained by light marsupial grazing and/or fire—all the way through to exotic ecosystems (dominated by cereal crops) where soil nutrients and soil disturbance are high; it is these inputs that maintain a non-native state at the expense of native species. The transitions (connecting arrows) represent the purported mechanism for grassland change, and whether those changes are thought to be reversible (i.e., an earlier vegetation state can be achieved with changes in disturbance, soil nutrients and ecological processes). Similar trajectories occur in other native grassland regions with land use, (e.g., see Sinclair et al. 2019) for a state and transition approach to vegetation change on the Victorian Volcanic Plains’.

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Understanding which processes regulate spatial variation in species abundance across their ranges is key in ecology. Species abundances may be affected by several factors, such as climate, elevation, land cover, species interactions and habitat protection status. However, few studies have focused on these effects synergistically across species ranges. Here, we evaluate how these factors affect the relative abundance of the Flat-faced Fruit-eating Bat Artibeus planirostris (Spix, 1823) (Chiroptera, Phyllostomidae) across its range. We obtained relative abundance data of A. planirostris through a literature review. We used temperature seasonality and precipitation seasonality as climate variables, elevation as topography, forested primary land and rangeland as fractional land cover patterns, species richness of potential competitors as a proxy for species competition, and habitat protection as protected (if within a protected area) or unprotected (if outside a protected area). We used multiple regression to assess the effects of the environmental variables on the relative abundance of A. planirostris, and we applied a spatial error model to control for spatial autocorrelation. Most localities exhibited a low abundance of A. planirostris. It is more abundant in the Pantanal and in the Caatinga. Protection status, rangeland and precipitation seasonality affected positively the abundance of A. planirostris, whereas competitor richness, elevation and temperature seasonality affected it negatively. Our results showed that competitor richness is the strongest predictor of the relative abundance of A. planirostris, which suggests that the presence of many competitors may have an important role in decreasing bat abundance. This pattern is consistent with expectations under the diffuse competition framework. Interestingly, protection status had a positive effect on its abundance, confirming that even common species benefit from protected areas. We can conclude that species interactions may be more important than previously thought to explain the spatial variation of species abundance than climate, topography and land cover.

Urbanisation has a wide range of impacts on biological communities, which can affect individual animals' health and may lead to population declines if health effects cause decreases in lifespan or reproductive output. Here, health metrics of the southwestern snake-necked turtle (Chelodina oblonga), a freshwater turtle endemic to and declining in southwestern Western Australia, were compared among populations from three wetlands in the Perth metropolitan area that differ in degree of urbanisation. In November 2023, 7–10 adult turtles were trapped in each of the three wetlands, scaled body condition was calculated, and a blood sample was collected from each individual to quantify blood glucose concentration and immune function, measured as bactericidal capacity, and baseline physiological stress level, measured as heterophil: lymphocyte ratio. There was no association between degree of urbanisation and any of the health metrics measured, suggesting that adult C. oblonga in populations from more natural habitats do not exhibit higher body condition, greater immune functioning or lower baseline physiological stress levels than adults from more disturbed habitats, and that impacts on individuals' health are likely not directly driving the apparent lack of recruitment observed in urban populations of this species. However, El Niño-induced drought conditions during the sampling period may have placed additional environmental stress on all populations, not just those in more urbanised areas, potentially masking differences in health that may have been detectable in years more reflective of mean climatic conditions. An important next step is to quantify potential seasonal and interannual changes in health metrics across a wider range of populations and hydrological regimes to determine the magnitude to which drought conditions impact physiology in this species, the extent to which physiological plasticity may buffer individuals against negative health impacts, and whether physiological plasticity differs along a broader gradient of anthropogenic disturbance.

Aerial webs are an extended phenotype that allow spiders to filter prey from the air. These webs also provide novel habitat that heterospecifics can exploit by providing scaffolding for web building, and thus access to air spaces that may not otherwise be attainable. In this study, we report on smaller orb-weaving spiders constructing aerial webs within those of larger spiders in Australia. Across Kooragang Island, New South Wales, Australia, we observed the orb webs of two different species, Larinia sp. and Tetragnatha sp., on the outskirts of larger host webs. These web associations showcase how the extended phenotype of one species can be exploited by another species for aerial web construction, given that the invading spiders are using the anchoring threads of their host to build their aerial web frameworks. The benefits of this behaviour may include a reduction in the amount of silk and time required to construct aerial webs, as well as gaining access to prey routes that improve foraging success. This does not appear to be associated with a risk of predation by the web hosts, who may tolerate the presence of the invader's web given that it does not impede prey capture and as there may be some degree of resource partitioning, or even benefits from hosting the invaders if they attract additional prey. It remains to be determined how these smaller spiders are able to detect the presence of larger webs to coalesce their own webs to and whether it is a chance association that is subsequently exploited or if web-in-web construction is encouraged by certain environmental conditions.

Dietary breadth enhances animal resilience in environments where resources are unpredictable or declining, enabling species to exploit alternative food sources when primary ones are scarce. In dung beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeinae), frugivory is an increasingly recognised foraging strategy, particularly in tropical regions experiencing mammalian declines. Here we evaluated the attractiveness of native Caryocar brasiliense (pequi) and exotic (banana) fruits to dung beetles in the Brazilian Cerrado. Furthermore, we compared the attractiveness of fresh and 48-h fermented pequi. We hypothesised that traps baited with native fruits (fresh and fermented) would attract higher abundance, biomass and diversity of dung beetles than those baited with exotic fruit, and that fermented pequi would be more attractive than fresh pequi due to the odour of decaying fruit. We collected 426 individuals, representing 14 dung beetle species, where Canthidium sp. was classified as specialist of fermented pequi. Traps baited with pequi, both fresh and fermented, attracted significantly higher diversity, abundance and biomass than banana. However, species richness and composition did not differ significantly among bait types, indicating generalist feeding strategies related to fruits. The fermentation stage of pequi did not influence attraction, suggesting that volatile cues from fresh fruits are sufficient to trigger beetle foraging, highlighting the role of native fruits in supporting dung beetle diversity. These findings highlight the potential of native fruits as an important food resource for dung beetles and underscore the importance of using native fruits known to attract these insects to improve fruit-based sampling methods for dung beetle assemblages in Neotropical landscapes.