Abstract
High-alpine ecosystems are commonly assumed to be particularly endangered by climate warming. Recent research, however, suggests that the heterogeneous topography of alpine landscapes provide microclimatic niches for alpine plants (i.e. soil temperatures that support the establishment and reproduction of species). Whether the microclimatic heterogeneity also affects diversity or species interactions on higher trophic levels remains unknown. Here we show that variation in mean seasonal soil temperature within an alpine pasture is within the same range as in plots differing in nearly 500 m in elevation. This pronounced heterogeneity of soil temperature among plots affected the spatial distribution of flowering plant species in our study area with a higher plant richness and cover in warmer plots. This increased plant productivity in warmer plots positively affected richness of flower visitor taxa as well as interaction frequency. Additionally, flower-visitor networks were more generalized in plots with higher plant cover. These results suggest that soil temperature directly affects plant diversity and productivity and indirectly affects network stability. The strong effect of heterogeneous soil temperature on plant communities and their interaction partners may also mitigate climate warming impacts by enabling plants to track their suitable temperature niches within a confined area.
Highlights
High-alpine ecosystems are commonly assumed to be endangered by climate warming
Regional plant diversity in alpine habitats is expected to change as a result of climate warming due to shifts in temperature niches and species’ distributions, which may result in increased competition due to shifts of plants’ distributions to higher elevations and the assembly of new communities[6,7,8]
Temperature is the main trigger of flowering phenology for alpine species and local variations in temperature can lead to a shift in flowering phenology[28,29], which may be relevant in alpine landscapes[30,31,32]
Summary
High-alpine ecosystems are commonly assumed to be endangered by climate warming. We hypothesize bottom-up effects of small-scale soil temperature heterogeneity on plant communities and on flower visiting insects and plant-insect interactions This effect across trophic levels may have implications for the potential of microclimate as buffer for climate change impacts by increasing overall diversity and by reducing possible mismatches in phenologies of plants and insects. To test for www.nature.com/scientificreports these possible direct and indirect effects of soil temperature we recorded mean seasonal soil temperature, plant communities and plant-insect interactions on 30 small-scale (1.5 × 1.5 m) microclimatic plots within 1.25 ha on a topographically heterogenous alpine pasture on the same elevation. This study is aiming to investigate microclimatic differences in root zone temperature of small-scale plots within a topographically heterogeneous alpine pasture with neglectable differences in elevation, as well as the effect of local soil temperature on plant and flower visitor communities, plant-insect interactions and network specialization
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