Functional traits as indicators of biodiversity response to land use changes across ecosystems and organisms
Vanderwalle, Marie; de Bello, Francesco; Berg, Matty P.; Bolger, Thomas; Doledec, Sylvain; Dubs, Florence; Feld, Christian K.; Harrington, Richard; Harrison, Paula A.; Lavorel, Sandra; da Silva, Pedro Martins; Moretti, Marco; Niemela, Jari; Santos, Paulo; Sattler, Thomas; Sousa, J.Paulo; Sykes, Martin T.; Vanbergen, Adam J. 
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8320-5535; Woodcock, Ben A. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0300-9951.
2010
Functional traits as indicators of biodiversity response to land use changes across ecosystems and organisms.
Biodiversity and Conservation, 19 (10).
2921-2947.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-010-9798-9
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Abstract/Summary
Rigorous and widely applicable indicators of biodiversity are needed to monitor the responses of ecosystems to global change and design effective conservation schemes. Among the potential indicators of biodiversity, those based on the functional traits of species and communities are interesting because they can be generalized to similar habitats and can be assessed by relatively rapid field assessment across eco-regions. Functional traits, however, have as yet been rarely considered in current common monitoring schemes. Moreover, standardized procedures of trait measurement and analyses have almost exclusively been developed for plants but different approaches have been used for different groups of organisms. Here we review approaches using functional traits as biodiversity indicators focussing not on plants as usual but particularly on animal groups that are commonly considered in different biodiversity monitoring schemes (benthic invertebrates, collembolans, above ground insects and birds). Further, we introduce a new framework based on functional traits indices and illustrate it using case studies where the traits of these organisms can help monitoring the response of biodiversity to different land use change drivers. We propose and test standard procedures to integrate different components of functional traits into biodiversity monitoring schemes across trophic levels and disciplines. We suggest that the development of indicators using functional traits could complement, rather than replace, the existent biodiversity monitoring. In this way, the comparison of the effect of land use changes on biodiversity is facilitated and is expected to positively influence conservation management practices.
| Item Type: | Publication - Article |
|---|---|
| Digital Object Identifier (DOI): | https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-010-9798-9 |
| Programmes: | CEH Topics & Objectives 2009 - 2012 > Biodiversity > BD Topic 1 - Observations, Patterns, and Predictions for Biodiversity |
| UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas: | Pywell Watt |
| ISSN: | 0960-3115 |
| Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.: | The final publication is available at http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10531-010-9798-9 |
| Additional Keywords: | Bbioindicators, birds, Carabids, Collembola, functional diversity, macroinvertebrates , community weighted mean trait, Standardized biodiversity monitoring |
| NORA Subject Terms: | Ecology and Environment |
| Date made live: | 07 Mar 2011 14:59 +0 (UTC) |
| URI: | https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/13657 |
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