Trophic redundancy reduces vulnerability to extinction cascades

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Dirk SandersF J Frank van Veen

Abstract

Current species extinction rates are at unprecedentedly high levels. While human activities can be the direct cause of some extinctions, it is becoming increasingly clear that species extinctions themselves can be the cause of further extinctions, since species affect each other through the network of ecological interactions among them. There is concern that the simplification of ecosystems, due to the loss of species and ecological interactions, increases their vulnerability to such secondary extinctions. It is predicted that more complex food webs will be less vulnerable to secondary extinctions due to greater trophic redundancy that can buffer against the effects of species loss. Here, we demonstrate in a field experiment with replicated plant-insect communities, that the probability of secondary extinctions is indeed smaller in food webs that include trophic redundancy. Harvesting one species of parasitoid wasp led to secondary extinctions of other, indirectly linked, species at the same trophic level. This effect was markedly stronger in simple communities than for the same species within a more complex food web. We show that this is due to functional redundancy in the more complex food webs and confirm this mechanism with...Continue Reading

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Citations

Jan 5, 2019·Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society·Sérgio P ÁvilaMarkes E Johnson
Jul 25, 2019·Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society·Christine FiggenerPamela T Plotkin
Jul 10, 2019·The Journal of Animal Ecology·J Christopher D TerryMichael B Bonsall
Apr 22, 2019·Global Change Biology·Matthew McLeanDavid Mouillot
Mar 5, 2020·Proceedings. Biological Sciences·Keenan StearsAdrian M Shrader
Jul 28, 2018·Proceedings. Biological Sciences·Jian ZhangJens-Christian Svenning
Jul 10, 2019·Ecology Letters·Sonia KéfiVasilis Dakos
Oct 14, 2020·Nature Ecology & Evolution·Lydia WhiteIan Donohue
Oct 18, 2020·The Journal of Animal Ecology·Edith Villa-GalavizJane Memmott
Jul 1, 2020·Environmental Pollution·Tiphaine MilleMathilde Monperrus
Feb 11, 2021·Ecology Letters·T Jonathan Davies
May 21, 2021·Ecology Letters·David MouillotArnaud Auber
Jul 15, 2021·Current Biology : CB·Nico Blüthgen, Michael Staab
Aug 5, 2021·Environmental Microbiology·Florent MazelAntoine Guisan
Sep 22, 2021·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Chloé Pozas-SchacreValeriano Parravicini
Aug 25, 2021·Integrative and Comparative Biology·Erica CrespiJared V Goldstone
Oct 5, 2021·Annual Review of Entomology·Erik H PoelmanJetske G de Boer

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Software Mentioned

R
vegan
package
R package lhs
R package deSolve
survdiff
lme4
nlme

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