Independent species in independent niches behave neutrally - Inria - Institut national de recherche en sciences et technologies du numérique Accéder directement au contenu
Article Dans Une Revue Oikos Année : 2011

Independent species in independent niches behave neutrally

Résumé

A (re)current theme in community ecology is the reconciliation of niche and neutral processes. However, analytical models combining these processes are scarce. Chisholm and Pacala (2010, hereafter referred to as CP10) strived to fill this void by assuming several independent (i.e. non-overlapping) niches each of which behaves neutrally as in Hubbell's neutral community model (Hubbell 2001). They observed that their model predicts species abundance distributions (SADs) that resemble the neutral predictions when community diversity is high. They concluded that neutral processes prevail over niche processes in determining SAD patterns for highly diverse communities. Here we argue that their result is an artefact due to a particular property of their model for high diversity: species independence. To show that species independence explains their results, we present a model consisting of independent (i.e. non-interacting) species. We show that 1) our model is equivalent to the model of CP10 when community diversity is high, and that 2) our model predicts SADs that are identical to neutral predictions for all levels of diversity. Hence, species independence is the sole cause of the neutral SADs observed in CP10.

Dates et versions

hal-02644148 , version 1 (28-05-2020)

Identifiants

Citer

Bart Haegeman, Rampal S. Etienne. Independent species in independent niches behave neutrally. Oikos, 2011, 120 (7), pp.961-963. ⟨10.1111/j.1600-0706.2011.19697.x⟩. ⟨hal-02644148⟩
162 Consultations
0 Téléchargements

Altmetric

Partager

Gmail Facebook X LinkedIn More