Dryad
Published February 16, 2016 | Version v1
Dataset Open

Data from: How habitat-modifying organisms structure the food web of two coastal ecosystems

Authors/Creators

  • 1. Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research
  • 2. University of Florida
  • 3. Radboud University Nijmegen
  • 4. University of Groningen
  • 5. Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
  • 6. Duke University
  • 7. University of Amsterdam

Description

The diversity and structure of ecosystems has been found to depend both on trophic interactions in food webs and on other species interactions such as habitat modification and mutualism that form non-trophic interaction networks. However, quantification of the dependencies between these two main interaction networks has remained elusive. In this study, we assessed how habitat-modifying organisms affect basic food web properties by conducting in-depth empirical investigations of two ecosystems: North American temperate fringing marshes and West African tropical seagrass meadows. Results reveal that habitat-modifying species, through non-trophic facilitation rather than their trophic role, enhance species richness across multiple trophic levels, increase the number of interactions per species (link density), but decrease the realized fraction of all possible links within the food web (connectance). Compared to the trophic role of the most highly connected species, we found this non-trophic effects to be more important for species richness and of more or similar importance for link density and connectance. Our findings demonstrate that food webs can be fundamentally shaped by interactions outside the trophic network, yet intrinsic to the species participating in it. Better integration of non-trophic interactions in food web analyses may therefore strongly contribute to their explanatory and predictive capacity.

Notes

Banc d'Arguin - Masterfile
This file contains the trophic and non-trophic interaction data from all sampling stations (bare, colonising and established) at Banc d'Arguin (seagrass meadows).
BdA_Masterfile.xlsx
Banc d'Arguin - Food webs with habitat modification effects by crabs removed
This file contains all matrices from which we removed species dependent on habitat modification by crabs.
BdA_HMcrabout.xlsx
Banc d'Arguin - Food webs with habitat modification effects by seagrass removed
This file contains matrices from which we removed species dependent on habitat modification by seagrass.
BdA_HMseagrassout.xlsx
Banc d'Arguin - Food webs with trophic effects by crabs removed
This file contains matrices from which we removed the burrowing crab (Callinectes) and any species and species exclusively feeding on it.
BdA_TEcrabout.xlsx
Banc d'Arguin - Food webs with trophic effects by seagrass removed
This file contains matrices from which we we removed seagrass (Zostra noltii) and any species exclusively feeding on it.
BdA_TEseagrassout.xlsx
Banc d'Arguin - Food webs with trophic effects by the most highly connected species removed
This file contains matrices from which we removed the most highly connected species and any species exclusively feeding on it.
BdA_HCout.xlsx
Banc d'Arguin - Relative effects of habitat modifiers and the most highly connected species
File summarising the relative effects of non-trophic facilitation by habitat modifiers and trophic effects by the most highly connected species on food web metrics.
BdA_RelEffects.xlsx
Rhode Island - Masterfile
This file contains the trophic and non-trophic interaction data from all sampling stations (bare, colonising and established) at Rhode Island (salt marshes).
RI_Masterfile.xlsx
Rhode Island - Food webs with habitat modification effects by ribbed mussels removed
This file contains all matrices from which we removed species dependent on habitat modification by ribbed mussels.
RI_HMgeukout.xlsx
Rhode Island - Food webs with habitat modification effects by cordgrass removed
This file contains all matrices from which we removed species dependent on habitat modification by cordgrass.
RI_HMspartinaout.xlsx
Rhode Island - Food webs with trophic effects by ribbed mussels removed
This file contains matrices from which we removed ribbed mussels (Geukensia demissa) and any species and species exclusively feeding on it.
RI_TEgeukout.xlsx
Rhode Island - Food webs with trophic effects by cordgrass removed
This file contains matrices from which we removed cordgrass (Spartina alterniflora) and any species and species exclusively feeding on it.
RI_TEspartout.xlsx
Rhode Island - Food webs with trophic effects by the most highly connected species removed
This file contains matrices from which we removed the most highly connected species and any species exclusively feeding on it.
RI_HCout.xlsx
Rhode Island - Relative effects of habitat modifiers and the most highly connected species
File summarising the relative effects of non-trophic facilitation by habitat modifiers and trophic effects by the most highly connected species on food web metrics.
RI_RelEffects.xlsx

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Additional details

Related works

Is cited by
10.1098/rspb.2015.2326 (DOI)