Increasing temperature may compensate for lower amounts of dead wood in driving richness of saproxylic beetles
Submitted by editor on 28 April 2015.
Get the paper! Dicerca berolinensis favors sun exposed dead wood of European beech.
By Joerg Muller
Saproxylic insects are strongly influenced by temperature but also require specific dead wood features, and thus interaction between the two factors is likely. Observation and experimental data corroborates that increasing temperature compensates at least partly for lower amounts of dead wood. Such a perspective contrasts the general assumption of reinforcing impacts of global warming and habitat loss on biodiversity, but it is corroborated by recent range expansions of threatened beetle species.
Full paper: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ecog.00908/abstract
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