Climatic conditions, trophic links between species and dispersal may induce spatial synchrony in population fluctuations. Spatial synchrony increases the extinction risk of populations and, thus, it is important to understand how synchrony-inducing mechanisms affect populations already threatened by habitat loss and climate change. For many species, it is unclear how population fluctuations vary over time and space, and what factors potentially drive this variation. In this study, we focus on fa...
Plant species can be characterized by different growth strategies related to their inherent growth and recovery rates, which shape their responses to stress and disturbance. Ecosystem engineering, however, offers an alternative way to cope with stress: modifying the environment may reduce stress levels. Using an experimental study on two seagrass species with contrasting traits, the slow-growing Zostera marina vs. the fast-growing Zostera japonica, we explored how growth strategies versus ecosys...
Water shortage events negatively impact plant productivity, threaten ecosystem functioning, and are predicted to increase dramatically in the coming years. Consequently, building a detailed understanding of how plants respond to water stress is critical for improving predictions of ecological processes and species range shifts under climate change. Here, we characterized patterns of intraspecific variation in dehydration tolerance (DhT, also dehydration tolerant) across a variable landscape in t...
The gene Clock is a key part of the Core Circadian Oscillator, and the length of the polyglutamine (poly-Q) repeat sequence in Clock (ClkpolyQcds) has been proposed to be associated with the timing of annual cycle events in birds. We tested whether variation in ClkpolyQcds corresponds to variation in migration timing in the bar-tailed godwit (Limosa lapponica baueri), a species in which individuals show strong annual consistency in their migration timing despite the New Zealand population migrat...
Why are some mammals more vulnerable to extinction than others? Past studies have explored many life history traits as correlates of extinction, but have not been successful at developing a unified understanding of why some species become extinct while other species persist despite living at the same time, under similar conditions, and facing equivalent challenges. I propose that the lens of wildlife behavior may bring into focus a more comprehensive view of why some species have gone extinct wh...
Invasions can trigger cascades in ecological communities by altering species interactions. Following the introduction of cats and foxes into Australia, one tenth of Australia’s terrestrial mammal species became extinct, due to predation, while many continue to decline. The broader consequences for Australian ecosystems are poorly understood. Soil-dwelling invertebrates are likely to be affected by the loss of fossorial native mammals, which are predators and disturbance agents. Using reintroduct...
Statistical regression relationships between the hydrogen (H) and oxygen (O) isotope ratios (δ2H and δ18O, respectively) of animal organic tissues and those of environmental water have been widely used to reconstruct animal movements, paleoenvironments, and diet and trophic relationships. In natural populations, however, tissue–environment isotopic relationships are highly variable among animal types and geographic regions. No systematic understanding of the origin(s) of this variability current...
#2Andrew P. Martin(CU: University of Colorado Boulder)H-Index: 41
Freshwater springs are important ecosystems. In the arid regions of North America, groundwater extraction has caused the desiccation of springs and the extinction of taxa. To better describe the biodiversity of freshwater springs in the hope of establishing a sensitive approach for monitoring the predicted change in spring systems, we used high-resolution genetic methods to estimate the alpha and beta diversity of 19 springs and two reservoirs within the Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in s...