ESTIMATES OF SPECIES EXTINCTIONS FROM SPECIES–AREA RELATIONSHIPS STRONGLY DEPEND ON ECOLOGICAL CONTEXT.
Matias M.G., Gravel D., Guilhaumon F., Desjardins-Proulx P., Loreau M., Munkemuller T. and Mouquet N. (2014).
Ecography 37, 1-12, doi:10.1111/j.1600-0587.2013.00448.x
Key message : In this study, we estimate species loss using a spatially explicit mechanistic simulation model to evaluate three important aspects of ecological context: coexistence mechanisms (e.g. species sorting, competition–colonization tradeoffs and neutral dynamics), spatial distribution of environmental conditions, and spatial pattern of habitat loss. We found that 1) area-based estimates of extinctions (both Species area SAR and endemics area EAR) are sensitive to coexistence mechanisms as well as to the pattern of environmental heterogeneity; 2) there is a strong interaction between coexistence mechanisms and the pattern of habitat loss; 3) SARs always yield higher estimates of species loss than do EARs; and 4) SARs and EARs consistently underestimate the realized species loss. Our results highlight the need to integrate ecological mechanisms in area-estimates of species loss which ignore the ecological context that shapes species distributions.
