The statement that the habitat complexity and structure govern the abundance and diversity of biological communities has been widely investigated. In this context, we assumed the hypothesis of habitat heterogeneity, that is, the higher habitat complexity leads to greater diversity of Odonata. In addition, we analyzed the influence of habitat structure on the distribution of this community, and ...

Ambient energy, niche conservatism, historical climate stability and habitat heterogeneity hypothesis have been proposed to explain the broad-scale species diversity patterns and species compositions, while their relative importance have been controversial. Here, we assessed the relative contributions of contemporary climate, historical climate changes and habitat heterogeneity in shaping Salix...

Positive correlations between diversity and stability have been reported for a number of ecosystems and are thought to be caused by a stabilizing effect of differential species’ responses to environmental perturbation. Empirical field studies in which investigators tested for diversity–stability relationships are lacking for some taxonomic groups and typically have not included tests of the imp...

The goal of this study was to assess the effect of the different habitats on rodent diversity, and to estimate the effect of changes in land use on the rodent abundance through different possible scenarios. We sampled poultry farms, human houses, riparian habitats, railway embankments, woodlots, pasture, crop fields and their borders. The habitats with highest frequency of captures were poultry...

Ecological studies on road’s impact on wildlife have concentrated on vertebrates although less is known of their effects on invertebrates. The current study presents public road influences on species richness, abundance, and diversity of ground dwelling insects in Arusha National Park in Tanzania. Values from pitfall traps data were generally higher in core habitat than road verge. Nine species...

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) play an essential role in complex ecosystems. However, the species diversity and composition of AMF communities remain unclear in semi-arid mountains. Further, it is not well understood if the characteristics of AMF community assemblies differ for different habitat types, e.g., agricultural arable land, artificial forest land, natural grassland, and bush/wood ...

Recent advances in analytical methods and exploration of regional diversity patterns in greater depth than simple whole-fauna patterns may change our understanding of the determinants of latitudinal gradients in species richness. Using a comprehensive database on the geographical distributions of the large fauna of endemic shorefishes from the Tropical Eastern Pacific (TEP), we delineated latit...

Floodplains are composed of aquatic and terrestrial habitats that are frequently reshaped by hydrologic processes operating at various spatial and temporal scales. I hypothesized that floodplain habitat complexity is maximized at intermediate discharges because small changes in flow result in substantial aquatic habitat changes and extreme discharges are associated with a decreased habitat hete...

Urbanization and loss of natural habitat has resulted in cities being identified as ecosystems capable of sustaining biotic communities and diversity. This study measured bird species diversity at Vadakkechira pond and surrounding areas during the period 2002-2009. This habitat is situated right in the heart of the city of Thrissur which is renowned for its historic importance and cultural extr...