Abstract
AbstractDetermining the scale of anthropogenic impacts is critical in order to understand ecosystem effects of human activities, within the context of changes caused by natural environmental variability. We applied spatial eigenfunction analysis to disentangle effects of anthropogenic drivers from environmental factors on species assembly in the Faroe-Shetland Channel (FSC), in the northeast Atlantic. We found that the species assembly considered here was structured at both small and large spatial scales. Specifically, substrate types, distance to oil wells and pipelines, the presence of objects and demersal fishing (both static and mobile) appeared significant in explaining large spatial scale species assembly structures. Conversely, temperature and variance in temperature shaped the species community across smaller spatial scales. Mobile scavenger species were found in areas impacted by demersal fishing. Oil and gas structures seemed to provide a habitat for a range of species including the commercially important fishes Molva sp. and Sebastes sp. These results demonstrate how the benthic ecosystem in the FSC has been shaped by multiple human activities, at both small and large spatial scales. Only by sampling datasets covering several sites, like in this study, can the effects of anthropogenic activities be separated from natural environmental controls.
Highlights
Ecological communities and processes such as recruitment or dispersal vary over temporal and spatial scales (Wiens, 1989)
Changing sampling scale when analysing the same ecological assemblage can lead to drastically different findings (Nogues-Bravo et al, 2008) and spatial analysis has been increasingly used in ecology in recent decades (Dale and Fortin, 2014)
Overall megafauna composition recorded in this study are in accordance with previous studies (Axelsson, 2003; Howell et al, 2007; Jones et al, 2007a; Kazanidis et al, 2019)
Summary
Ecological communities and processes such as recruitment or dispersal vary over temporal and spatial scales (Wiens, 1989). Changing sampling scale when analysing the same ecological assemblage can lead to drastically different findings (Nogues-Bravo et al, 2008) and spatial analysis has been increasingly used in ecology in recent decades (Dale and Fortin, 2014). This is important with recent fast temporal changes observed in ecosystems as a consequence of human activities and global climatic change (Halpern et al, 2008).
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