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Climate-driven variation in dispersal ability predicts responses to forest fragmentation in birds

Lookup NU author(s): Dr Marion PfeiferORCiD

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).

Abstract

© 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited. Species sensitivity to forest fragmentation varies latitudinally, peaking in the tropics. A prominent explanation for this pattern is that historical landscape disturbance at higher latitudes has removed fragmentation-sensitive species or promoted the evolution of more resilient survivors. However, it is unclear whether this so-called extinction filter is the dominant driver of geographic variation in fragmentation sensitivity, particularly because climatic factors may also cause latitudinal gradients in dispersal ability, a key trait mediating sensitivity to habitat fragmentation. Here we combine field survey data with a morphological proxy for avian dispersal ability (hand-wing index) to assess responses to forest fragmentation in 1,034 bird species worldwide. We find that fragmentation sensitivity is strongly predicted by dispersal limitation and that other factors—latitude, body mass and historical disturbance events—have relatively limited explanatory power after accounting for species differences in dispersal. We also show that variation in dispersal ability is only weakly predicted by historical disturbance and more strongly associated with intra-annual temperature fluctuations (seasonality). Our results suggest that climatic factors play a dominant role in driving global variation in the impacts of forest fragmentation, emphasizing the need for more nuanced environmental policies that take into account local context and associated species traits.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Weeks TL, Betts MG, Pfeifer M, Wolf C, Banks-Leite C, Barbaro L, Barlow J, Cerezo A, Kennedy CM, Kormann UG, Marsh CJ, Olivier PI, Phalan BT, Possingham HP, Wood EM, Tobias JA

Publication type: Article

Publication status: Published

Journal: Nature Ecology and Evolution

Year: 2023

Volume: 7

Issue: 7

Pages: 1079-1091

Print publication date: 01/07/2023

Online publication date: 29/05/2023

Acceptance date: 18/04/2023

Date deposited: 27/10/2023

ISSN (electronic): 2397-334X

Publisher: Springer Nature

URL: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-023-02077-x

DOI: 10.1038/s41559-023-02077-x

ePrints DOI: 10.57711/t8je-g867

PubMed id: 37248334

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