Diversity, Community/Regional Level

Abstract

An ecological community is a collection of species living contemporaneously in the same place and comprising populations of individuals that are spatially interspersed and among which direct and indirect interactions can potentially take place. Communities are nested within larger biogeographical regions that comprise many different habitats and that have unique evolutionary histories. Species can disperse among suitable habitats in the region and thus define the species pool for communities occupying those habitats. Species interactions, habitat differences, history, and dispersal have all been hypothesized to influence species diversity in communities, and thus community and regional species diversity are inextricably linked. This article presents two perspectives on the control of community and regional diversity, the nature of the linkage between community and regional diversity, and methods for examining this linkage. Guidelines for synthesizing community and regional perspectives are also considered.