Abstract
Understanding the effects of global warming on trait variation and trophic structure is a crucial challenge in the 21st century. However, there is a lack of general patterns that can be used to predict trait variation and community trophic structure under the ongoing environmental change. We investigated the responses of body size and community trophic structure of zooplankton to climate related factors (e.g., temperature). Isotopic niche breadth was applied to investigate the community trophic structure across a 1‐year study from a subtropical reservoir (Tingxi Reservoir) in southeastern China. Body size and community isotopic niche breadth of zooplankton were larger during water mixing than stratification periods and correlated significantly with water temperature change along the time series. The contributions of intra‐ and intertaxonomic components to body size and community trophic structure variation showed significant relationships with the temperature change going from the mixing to stratification periods. Water temperature imposed direct effect on body size, while direct and indirect effect on the community trophic structure of zooplankton occurred through trophic redundancy along time series. Water temperature and community properties (e.g., body size, trophic redundancy, or trophic interaction) showed complex interactions and integrated to influence community trophic structure of zooplankton. Our results can expand the knowledge of how elevated temperature will alter individual trait and community trophic structure under future climate change.
Highlights
In an increasingly human‐modified world, there is a growing urgency to understand how the trophic structure and biotic interactions are influenced by global warming (Dézerald et al, 2018; Rosenblatt & Schmitz, 2016)
While we have highlighted the importance of water temperature on body size and community trophic structure of zooplankton in the stratification period, we found that temperature change potentially plays a key role on body size and community trophic structure through altering the ecological role of intrataxonomic group variation
We investigated temporal variation in body size and com‐ munity trophic structure of zooplankton, as well as their key ecological drivers in a subtropical reservoir across a 1‐year study
Summary
In an increasingly human‐modified world, there is a growing urgency to understand how the trophic structure and biotic interactions are influenced by global warming (Dézerald et al, 2018; Rosenblatt & Schmitz, 2016). Stable isotope analysis has been increasingly ap‐ plied to investigate structure and functioning of animals (Catry et al, 2016) or to assess intraspecific and interspecific variation (Lemmens et al, 2017) by providing quantitative information on both resource and habitat uses (Fry, 2006) This information is commonly utilized to define ecological niche space (Layman, Arrington, Montaña, & Post, 2007; Newsome et al, 2007). Community difference can be partitioned into species sorting (SS), intraspecific trait variation (ITV), and species turnover (ST) using the Price equation (Price, 1970) This method can help identify the relative importance of intra‐ and interspecific variation on community trophic structure and body size between ecosystems with contrasting ecology (Govaert, Pantel, & De Meester, 2016; Lemmens et al, 2017). How do direct and indirect effects of water temperature, other environmental change, and body size integrate to influence com‐ munity trophic structure of zooplankton?
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