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Teixeira Colombo, Guthieri, Di Ponzio, Raffaello, Benchimol, Maíra, Peres, Carlos A. 
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1588-8765 and Bobrowiec, Paulo Estefano D.
(2023)
Functional diversity and trait filtering of insectivorous bats on forest islands created by an Amazonian mega dam.
Functional Ecology, 37 (1).
pp. 99-111.
ISSN 0269-8463
Abstract
Mega dams in lowland tropical forests often create large archipelagos, leading to biodiversity decay and disruption of ecosystem functioning in remnant habitat islands. We investigated the functional diversity and functional trait filtering of aerial insectivorous bats in both insular forest patches created by a vast ~30-year-old hydropower reservoir and the adjacent mainland continuous forest in Central Amazonia. Bats were surveyed using passive bat recorders across 34 forest sites. Based on a set of morphological traits derived for each species recorded, we estimated both the bat functional richness, functional evenness and functional dispersion at each surveyed site. We further assessed the effects of local vegetation, patch and landscape features on patterns of functional diversity. The interaction between functional traits, environmental characteristics, and species distribution was investigated using a combination of RLQ and fourth-corner analyses. We found that mainland sites retained higher functional richness and lower functional evenness compared to forest islands, indicating a more complete functional assemblage in the mainland. Additionally, species composition was affected by local vegetation structure and forest area, with small isolated islands exhibiting pervasive loss of functional traits. RLQ and fourth-corner analyses showed that larger understorey foraging species with greater dispersal capacity, constant frequency–frequency modulated calls, and higher frequency of maximum energy were associated with more isolated small islands. Conversely, forest subcanopy species, exhibiting quasi-constant frequency calls and presenting low dispersal capacity were associated with continuous forests and islands with greater forest area, and were therefore more sensitive to habitat insularization. Our study calls attention to the pervasive impacts induced by large dams on the functional diversity of tropical insectivorous bats. We recommend that future assessments of the effects of habitat fragmentation on mammals should include traits linked to ecosystem services. In designing and licensing new dams, we suggest the creation of extensive protected areas surrounding mainland forests to minimize the detrimental impacts of small isolated islands and safeguard the full complement of key ecological functions provided by insectivorous bats. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.
| Item Type: | Article |
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| Additional Information: | Funding Information: This study was funded by the The Rufford Small Grant Foundation (#19493‐1), National Geographic Society (Young Explorer Grant #9997‐16), Idea Wild, WCS Research Fellowship Program, The Conservation Food and Health Foundation, ARPA, Amazonas Distribuidora de Energia S/A, and Associacão Comunidade Waimiri Atroari. We are grateful to ICMBio (Chico Mendes Institute of Biodiversity), REBIO Uatumã/ICMBio and Gilmar Klein for providing logistical support during fieldwork. GTC and RDP was supported by a Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico scholarship. PEDB was supported by a postdoctoral scholarship from Programa Nacional de Pós‐Doutorado/Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (88887.370067/2019‐00). We are grateful to Fábio Zanella Farneda who provided data on bat wing morphology, and Dedeu and Thiago Bicudo Krempel Santana for assistance during fieldwork. We are grateful to Matthias Schleuning, associate editor and two anonymous reviewers for valuable insights on the manuscript. |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | central amazon,chiroptera,functional ecology,habitat fragmentation,hydropower projects,life-history traits,rlq and fourth-corner analyses,trait-environment relationships,ecology, evolution, behavior and systematics ,/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/1100/1105 |
| Faculty \ School: | University of East Anglia Research Groups/Centres > Theme - ClimateUEA |
| UEA Research Groups: | Faculty of Science > Research Centres > Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Conservation |
| Related URLs: | |
| Depositing User: | LivePure Connector |
| Date Deposited: | 21 Mar 2023 10:30 |
| Last Modified: | 21 Mar 2023 10:30 |
| URI: | https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/91632 |
| DOI: | 10.1111/1365-2435.14118 |
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