The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt
Plant–visitor food webs provide important insights into species interactions, and more information about their seasonal dynamics is vital to understanding the resilience of species to external pressures. Studies of Arctic networks can also improve our understanding of species responses to the pressu...
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Language: | English |
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Canadian Science Publishing
2021
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Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10037/24221 https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2020-0056 |
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ftunivtroemsoe:oai:munin.uit.no:10037/24221 2023-05-15T14:19:59+02:00 The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt Gillespie, Mark Andrew Cooper, Elisabeth 2021-07-19 https://hdl.handle.net/10037/24221 https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2020-0056 eng eng Canadian Science Publishing Arctic Science Gillespie, Cooper. The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt. Arctic Science. 2021 FRIDAID 1982236 doi:10.1139/as-2020-0056 2368-7460 https://hdl.handle.net/10037/24221 openAccess Copyright 2021 The Author(s) Journal article Tidsskriftartikkel Peer reviewed publishedVersion 2021 ftunivtroemsoe https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2020-0056 2022-03-02T23:57:49Z Plant–visitor food webs provide important insights into species interactions, and more information about their seasonal dynamics is vital to understanding the resilience of species to external pressures. Studies of Arctic networks can also improve our understanding of species responses to the pressures of climate change. This study provides the first description of a plant – insect visitor network in Svalbard, a High Arctic archipelago already experiencing the consequences of climate change. A subset of the network was collected from experimental plots where the snow melt date was delayed with snow fences. The deep snow plots delayed flowering and we expected this to disrupt plant–visitor interactions compared with ambient snow conditions. However, the composition of flowers and insect visitors were similar between regimes, and the network tracked patterns of overall flowering phenology. Nevertheless, the deep snow significantly reduced the average overlap between flower availability and insect activity, reducing the probability of an interaction. We suggest that at a landscape scale, Arctic pollinators will benefit from patchy changes to snow melt that maintain heterogeneity in the timing of flowering but changes that increase homogeneity in snowmelt across the landscape may negatively impact some species Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Arctic Archipelago Arctic Climate change Svalbard University of Tromsø: Munin Open Research Archive Arctic Svalbard Arctic Science 1 18 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of Tromsø: Munin Open Research Archive |
op_collection_id |
ftunivtroemsoe |
language |
English |
description |
Plant–visitor food webs provide important insights into species interactions, and more information about their seasonal dynamics is vital to understanding the resilience of species to external pressures. Studies of Arctic networks can also improve our understanding of species responses to the pressures of climate change. This study provides the first description of a plant – insect visitor network in Svalbard, a High Arctic archipelago already experiencing the consequences of climate change. A subset of the network was collected from experimental plots where the snow melt date was delayed with snow fences. The deep snow plots delayed flowering and we expected this to disrupt plant–visitor interactions compared with ambient snow conditions. However, the composition of flowers and insect visitors were similar between regimes, and the network tracked patterns of overall flowering phenology. Nevertheless, the deep snow significantly reduced the average overlap between flower availability and insect activity, reducing the probability of an interaction. We suggest that at a landscape scale, Arctic pollinators will benefit from patchy changes to snow melt that maintain heterogeneity in the timing of flowering but changes that increase homogeneity in snowmelt across the landscape may negatively impact some species |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Gillespie, Mark Andrew Cooper, Elisabeth |
spellingShingle |
Gillespie, Mark Andrew Cooper, Elisabeth The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
author_facet |
Gillespie, Mark Andrew Cooper, Elisabeth |
author_sort |
Gillespie, Mark Andrew |
title |
The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
title_short |
The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
title_full |
The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
title_fullStr |
The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
title_full_unstemmed |
The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
title_sort |
seasonal dynamics of a high arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt |
publisher |
Canadian Science Publishing |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
https://hdl.handle.net/10037/24221 https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2020-0056 |
geographic |
Arctic Svalbard |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Svalbard |
genre |
Arctic Arctic Archipelago Arctic Climate change Svalbard |
genre_facet |
Arctic Arctic Archipelago Arctic Climate change Svalbard |
op_relation |
Arctic Science Gillespie, Cooper. The seasonal dynamics of a High Arctic plant–visitor network: temporal observations and responses to delayed snow melt. Arctic Science. 2021 FRIDAID 1982236 doi:10.1139/as-2020-0056 2368-7460 https://hdl.handle.net/10037/24221 |
op_rights |
openAccess Copyright 2021 The Author(s) |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2020-0056 |
container_title |
Arctic Science |
container_start_page |
1 |
op_container_end_page |
18 |
_version_ |
1766291720382709760 |