Abstract
The global biodiversity loss has raised interest in the different facets of diversity, and the importance of diversity for ecosystem functions has been recognized. However, our knowledge on seasonal and inter-annual variation in the composition and diversity of communities is still poor. Here, we investigated the seasonal and inter-annual changes in taxonomic and functional community composition and diversity of benthic diatoms in a coastal habitat of the northern Baltic Sea, where seasonal and inter-annual variation of climate is pronounced. We found that the taxonomic and functional alpha diversity remained stable at seasonal and inter-annual level despite strong changes in community composition. However, alpha diversity decreased during an exceptionally warm winter possibly due to disturbances induced by the lack of ice. This may suggest that climate warming and consequently limited ice cover will affect the diversity of benthic communities.
Highlights
The current global biodiversity crisis threatens all ecosystems and has increased interest in studying the diversity of different organisms on different scales
A great amount of research has resolved patterns of diversity and its effects on different aspects of ecosystem functioning and services, such as productivity (e.g., Smith, 2007; Cadotte et al, 2009) and nutrient cycling (e.g., Smetacek, 1999; Spilling et al, 2018). Some of these studies have presented snapshot results across spatial gradients (e.g., Virta et al, 2019) while others have included temporal variation (e.g., Morin et al, 2014), but most of them have neglected the strong seasonal and inter-annual variation that occurs across most parts of the globe
We studied the seasonal and inter-annual variation in the taxonomic and functional structure and diversity of littoral benthic diatom communities in the Baltic Sea, where seasons and years are climatically highly variable
Summary
The current global biodiversity crisis threatens all ecosystems and has increased interest in studying the diversity of different organisms on different scales. A great amount of research has resolved patterns of diversity and its effects on different aspects of ecosystem functioning and services, such as productivity (e.g., Smith, 2007; Cadotte et al, 2009) and nutrient cycling (e.g., Smetacek, 1999; Spilling et al, 2018) Some of these studies have presented snapshot results across spatial gradients (e.g., Virta et al, 2019) while others have included temporal variation (e.g., Morin et al, 2014), but most of them have neglected the strong seasonal and inter-annual variation that occurs across most parts of the globe (but see Hillebrand et al, 2010). Temporal changes in the taxonomy affect the functional composition and diversity of the communities, which are often more effective than taxonomy in showing the relationship
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