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Pollinator extinctions alter structure of ecological networks
http://esciencecommons.blogspot.com/2017/06/pollinator-extinctions-alter-structure.html[font face=Serif]Wednesday, June 21, 2017
[font size=5]Pollinator extinctions alter structure of ecological networks[/font]
By Carol Clark
[font size=3]The absence of a single dominant bumblebee species from an ecosystem disrupts foraging patterns among a broad range of remaining pollinators in the system — from other bees to butterflies, beetles and more, field experiments show.
Biology Letters published the research, which may have implications for the survival of both rare wild plants and major food crops as many pollinator species are in decline.
“We see an ecological cascade of effects across the whole pollinator community, fundamentally changing the structure of plant-pollinator interaction networks,” says Berry Brosi, a biologist at Emory University and lead author of the study. “We can see this shift in who visits which plant even in pollinators that are not closely related to the bumblebee species that we remove from the system.”
If a single, dominant species of bumblebee mainly visits an alpine sunflower, for instance, other pollinators — including other species of bumblebees — are less likely to visit alpine sunflowers. If the dominant bumblebee is removed, however, the dynamic changes.
…[/font][/font]
[font size=5]Pollinator extinctions alter structure of ecological networks[/font]
By Carol Clark
[font size=3]The absence of a single dominant bumblebee species from an ecosystem disrupts foraging patterns among a broad range of remaining pollinators in the system — from other bees to butterflies, beetles and more, field experiments show.
Biology Letters published the research, which may have implications for the survival of both rare wild plants and major food crops as many pollinator species are in decline.
“We see an ecological cascade of effects across the whole pollinator community, fundamentally changing the structure of plant-pollinator interaction networks,” says Berry Brosi, a biologist at Emory University and lead author of the study. “We can see this shift in who visits which plant even in pollinators that are not closely related to the bumblebee species that we remove from the system.”
If a single, dominant species of bumblebee mainly visits an alpine sunflower, for instance, other pollinators — including other species of bumblebees — are less likely to visit alpine sunflowers. If the dominant bumblebee is removed, however, the dynamic changes.
…[/font][/font]