Functional diversity of plant-pollinator interaction webs enhances the persistence of plant communities

Pollination is exclusively or mainly animal mediated for 70% to 90% of angiosperm species. Thus, pollinators provide an essential ecosystem service to humankind. However, the impact of human-induced biodiversity loss on the functioning of plant-pollinator interactions has not been tested experimenta...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PLoS biology 2006-01, Vol.4 (1), p.e1-e1
Main Authors: Fontaine, Colin, Dajoz, Isabelle, Meriguet, Jacques, Loreau, Michel
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal Behavior
Animals
Bees - anatomy & histology
Bees - physiology
Biodiversity
Botany
Diptera - anatomy & histology
Diptera - physiology
Ecology
Ecology, environment
Ecosystem
Ecosystems
Flowers & plants
Life Sciences
Lotus - anatomy & histology
Lotus - physiology
Matricaria - anatomy & histology
Matricaria - physiology
Medicago sativa - anatomy & histology
Medicago sativa - physiology
Mimulus - anatomy & histology
Mimulus - physiology
Plant Physiological Phenomena
Plant reproduction
Plant Science
Pollen - physiology
Proteins
Raphanus - anatomy & histology
Raphanus - physiology
Reproduction - physiology
Seeds - physiology
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Pollination is exclusively or mainly animal mediated for 70% to 90% of angiosperm species. Thus, pollinators provide an essential ecosystem service to humankind. However, the impact of human-induced biodiversity loss on the functioning of plant-pollinator interactions has not been tested experimentally. To understand how plant communities respond to diversity changes in their pollinating fauna, we manipulated the functional diversity of both plants and pollinators under natural conditions. Increasing the functional diversity of both plants and pollinators led to the recruitment of more diverse plant communities. After two years the plant communities pollinated by the most functionally diverse pollinator assemblage contained about 50% more plant species than did plant communities pollinated by less-diverse pollinator assemblages. Moreover, the positive effect of functional diversity was explained by a complementarity between functional groups of pollinators and plants. Thus, the functional diversity of pollination networks may be critical to ecosystem sustainability.
ISSN:1545-7885
1544-9173
1545-7885
DOI:10.1371/journal.pbio.0040001