Global Associations Between Terrestrial Producer And Vertebrate Consumer Diversity

Main Category: Biology / Biochemistry
Article Date: 02 Oct 2008 - 2:00 PDT

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In nature we often find strong positive associations between the diversity of plants and animals. Does this reflect causal links between producers and consumers, or plants providing habitat, or simply similar associations with environmental conditions?

We provide a global evaluation. We find that across regions after accounting for environmental differences little variation in vertebrate richness is explained by plant diversity.

While strong associations between plants and consumers have been amply demonstrated at local plots, across regions worldwide these direct links appear to be weak and different factors seem to drive the observed similarity in richness gradients.

Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

Proceedings B is the Royal Society's flagship biological research journal, dedicated to the rapid publication and broad dissemination of high-quality research papers, reviews and comment and reply papers. The scope of journal is diverse and is especially strong in organismal biology.

Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences