Effects of climate and forest development on habitat specialization and biodiversity in Central European mountain forests.

ABSTRACT: Mountain forests are biodiversity hotspots with competing hypotheses proposed to explain elevational trends in habitat specialization and species richness. The altitudinal-niche-breadth hypothesis suggests decreasing specialization with elevation, which could lead to decreasing species richness and weaker differences in species richness and beta diversity among habitat types with increasing elevation. Testing these predictions for bacteria, fungi, plants, arthropods, and vertebrates, we found decreasing habitat specialization (represented by forest developmental stages) with elevation in mountain forests of the Northern Alps - supporting the altitudinal-niche-breadth hypothesis. Species richness decreased with elevation only for arthropods, whereas changes in beta diversity varied among ta

SUBMITTER: Richter T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11568152 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature