Journal ArticleDOI
Niche breadth predicts geographical range size: a general ecological pattern.
TLDR
Despite significant variability in the strength of the relationship among studies, the general positive relationship suggests that specialist species might be disproportionately vulnerable to habitat loss and climate change due to synergistic effects of a narrow niche and small range size.Abstract:
The range of resources that a species uses (i.e. its niche breadth) might determine the geographical area it can occupy, but consensus on whether a niche breadth–range size relationship generally exists among species has been slow to emerge. The validity of this hypothesis is a key question in ecology in that it proposes a mechanism for commonness and rarity, and if true, may help predict species' vulnerability to extinction. We identified 64 studies that measured niche breadth and range size, and we used a meta-analytic approach to test for the presence of a niche breadth–range size relationship. We found a significant positive relationship between range size and environmental tolerance breadth (z = 0.49), habitat breadth (z = 0.45), and diet breadth (z = 0.28). The overall positive effect persisted even when incorporating sampling effects. Despite significant variability in the strength of the relationship among studies, the general positive relationship suggests that specialist species might be disproportionately vulnerable to habitat loss and climate change due to synergistic effects of a narrow niche and small range size. An understanding of the ecological and evolutionary mechanisms that drive and cause deviations from this niche breadth–range size pattern is an important future research goal.read more
Citations
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Seven Shortfalls that Beset Large-Scale Knowledge of Biodiversity
Joaquín Hortal,Francesco de Bello,José Alexandre Felizola Diniz-Filho,Thomas M. Lewinsohn,Jorge M. Lobo,Richard J. Ladle +5 more
TL;DR: The concept of knowledge shortfalls is updated and the tradeoffs between generality and uncertainty are reviewed and a general framework for the combined impacts and consequences of shortfalls of large-scale biodiversity knowledge is concluded.
Journal ArticleDOI
On the relative abundance of autopolyploids and allopolyploids.
Journal ArticleDOI
Museum specimens reveal loss of pollen host plants as key factor driving wild bee decline in The Netherlands.
Jeroen Scheper,Menno Reemer,Ruud van Kats,Wim A. Ozinga,Wim A. Ozinga,Giel T. J. van der Linden,Joop H.J. Schaminée,Joop H.J. Schaminée,Henk Siepel,Henk Siepel,David Kleijn +10 more
TL;DR: It is shown that decline of preferred host plant species was one of two main factors associated with bee decline, and that mitigation strategies for loss of wild bees will only be effective if they target the specific host plants of declining bee species.
Journal ArticleDOI
Evolution of Ecological Niche Breadth
TL;DR: Whether niche breadth determines diversification and distribution breadth and how niche breadth is partitioned among individuals and populations within a species are important but particularly understudied topics.
References
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Journal Article
Dietary niche breadth for Central European birds: correlations with species-specific traits
TL;DR: A clear indication of phylogenetic conservatism is found and robust correlations of dietary niche breadth versus migratory behaviour as well as sexual size dimorphism are found: species with a narrow dietary niche tend to be migratory and, inspecies with a broad dietary niche, males tends to be larger than females.
Journal ArticleDOI
Patterns of rarity in the native British flora
TL;DR: It is shown that threat status is correlated with small size, low fecundity, and insect rather than wind pollination for the native British flora.
Journal ArticleDOI
Rarity and extinction risk in coral reef angelfishes on isolated islands: interrelationships among abundance, geographic range size and specialisation
TL;DR: Comparisons of abundance and specialisation in endemic and widespread angelfishes at the remote Christmas and Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean confirmed that endemics are not immune to the increasing severity of large-scale disturbances that can affect species throughout their geographic range.
Journal ArticleDOI
Niche breadth and geographical range: ecological compensation for geographical rarity in rainforest frogs.
Yvette M. Williams,Stephen E. Williams,Stephen E. Williams,Ross A. Alford,Michelle Waycott,Christopher N. Johnson,Christopher N. Johnson +6 more
TL;DR: It is argued that geographically rare and therefore extinction-prone species are more likely to persist if they are diet generalists, and macroecological theory predicts that species with broad niches should have the largest geographical ranges.
Journal ArticleDOI
When species become generalists: on‐going large‐scale changes in bird habitat specialization
TL;DR: Habitat specialization is a labile ecological trait, which may change in the short term following habitat degradation, density dependence and source–sink dynamics, and accounting for short-term temporal variations in observed habitat specialization can increase the understanding of the effects of global changes on species strategies and community dynamics.