TY - JOUR
T1 - The effect of environmental gradient on biodiversity and similarity of invertebrate communities in eelgrass (Zostera marina) beds
AU - Namba, Mizuho
AU - Hashimoto, Marina
AU - Ito, Minako
AU - Momota, Kyosuke
AU - Smith, Carter
AU - Yorisue, Takefumi
AU - Nakaoka, Masahiro
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank S. Hamano and H. Katsuragawa of Akkeshi Marine Station, Hokkaido University, K. Kawajiri and other members of the Nishi-Abashiri Fisheries Union, the Abashiri City Fisheries Science Center, Abashiri City, S. Chiba of Tokyo University of Agriculture and K. Sakaguchi and other members of the Aquaculture Fishery Cooperative of Saroma Lake for technical and logistical support. We also thank T. Hasegawa, D. Hayashi, N. Hookabe, T. Imamura, M. Kishimoto, K. Takahoshi, Z. Tamura, N. Ueno, and R. Yamamoto for their assistance with laboratory and field work. We also would like to thank three anonymous reviewers for their comments on this manuscript. This research was partially funded by the Sasakawa Scientific Research Grant of the Japan Science Society and the Research Fellowship for Young Scientists by JSPS KAKENHI awarded to M. N., the Environment Research and Technology Development Fund (S-15 Predicting and Assessing Natural Capital and Ecosystem Services [PANCES]) of the Ministry of the Environment, Japan, and a grant from the Aquaculture Fishery Cooperative of Saroma Lake to M. N., and a joint National Science Foundation and JSPS East Asia and Pacific Summer Institutes Grant (OISE-1613161) to C. S.
PY - 2020/1/1
Y1 - 2020/1/1
N2 - Environmental filtering and dispersal limitation are important processes within the metacommunity concept. Non-random species turnover occurs in places where environmental filtering plays the key role in determining local community structure, whereas dispersal limitation causes nested patterns of species assemblages organized by non-random colonization processes. However, factors that modify the relative importance of these processes remain unclear for many ecosystems. We tested whether salinity gradient affect the relative importance of environmental filtering and dispersal limitation for structuring epifaunal and infaunal communities in three lagoons in Hokkaido, Japan, that have different salinity gradients. Specifically, we compared patterns of species diversity and similarity of eelgrass-associated invertebrate assemblages across space. Beta diversity (i.e., species turnover among different sites in each lagoon) was highest in Akkeshi, the lagoon with the salinity gradients. Variation partitioning of similarity components showed that spatial variation in the community assemblage pattern was mostly explained by environmental filtering in Akkeshi, but that it was explained more by species dispersal patterns and the difference in eelgrass biomass and shoot density in Notoro and Saroma, the lagoons without clear salinity gradient. Redundancy analysis showed that spatial variation in community structure was related to salinity and eelgrass biomass in Akkeshi, and to eelgrass aboveground biomass in Notoro and Saroma. Our findings highlight the effects of environmental heterogeneity on beta diversity and community structure and indicate that environmental gradients can be a key factor causing a shift in the relative importance of different metacommunity processes and the role of the foundation species in provisioning habitat.
AB - Environmental filtering and dispersal limitation are important processes within the metacommunity concept. Non-random species turnover occurs in places where environmental filtering plays the key role in determining local community structure, whereas dispersal limitation causes nested patterns of species assemblages organized by non-random colonization processes. However, factors that modify the relative importance of these processes remain unclear for many ecosystems. We tested whether salinity gradient affect the relative importance of environmental filtering and dispersal limitation for structuring epifaunal and infaunal communities in three lagoons in Hokkaido, Japan, that have different salinity gradients. Specifically, we compared patterns of species diversity and similarity of eelgrass-associated invertebrate assemblages across space. Beta diversity (i.e., species turnover among different sites in each lagoon) was highest in Akkeshi, the lagoon with the salinity gradients. Variation partitioning of similarity components showed that spatial variation in the community assemblage pattern was mostly explained by environmental filtering in Akkeshi, but that it was explained more by species dispersal patterns and the difference in eelgrass biomass and shoot density in Notoro and Saroma, the lagoons without clear salinity gradient. Redundancy analysis showed that spatial variation in community structure was related to salinity and eelgrass biomass in Akkeshi, and to eelgrass aboveground biomass in Notoro and Saroma. Our findings highlight the effects of environmental heterogeneity on beta diversity and community structure and indicate that environmental gradients can be a key factor causing a shift in the relative importance of different metacommunity processes and the role of the foundation species in provisioning habitat.
KW - eastern Hokkaido
KW - environmental filtering
KW - epifauna and infauna
KW - metacommunity
KW - salinity gradient
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U2 - 10.1111/1440-1703.12086
DO - 10.1111/1440-1703.12086
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85078186183
VL - 35
SP - 61
EP - 75
JO - Ecological Research
JF - Ecological Research
SN - 0912-3814
IS - 1
ER -