Warming alters energetic structure and function but not resilience of soil food webs
Abstract
Climate warming is predicted to alter the structure, stability, and functioning of food webs. Yet, despite the importance of soil food webs for energy and nutrient turnover in terrestrial ecosystems, the effects of warming on these food webs—particularly in combination with other global change drivers—are largely unknown. Here, we present results from two complementary field experiments that test the interactive effects of warming with forest canopy disturbance and drought on energy flux in boreal–temperate ecotonal forest soil food webs. The first experiment applied a simultaneous above- and belowground warming treatment (ambient, +1.7 °C, +3.4 °C) to closed-canopy and recently clear-cut forest, simulating common forest disturbance6. The second experiment crossed warming with a summer drought treatment (-40% rainfall) in the clear-cut habitats. We show that warming reduces energy flux to microbes, while forest canopy disturbance and drought facilitates warming-induced increases in energy flux to higher trophic levels and exacerbates the reduction in energy flux to microbes, respectively. Contrary to expectations, we find no change in whole-network resilience to perturbations, but significant losses in ecosystem functioning. Warming thus interacts with forest disturbance and drought, shaping the energetic structure of soil food webs and threatening the provisioning of multiple ecosystem functions in boreal–temperatemore »
- Authors:
-
[1];
[2];
[4];
[3]
- Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States); Albert-Ludwigs-Univ. Freiburg, Freiburg (Germany)
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig (German); Leipzig Univ., Leipzig (Germany); Univ. of Muenster, Muenster (Germany)
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig (German); Leipzig Univ., Leipzig (Germany)
- Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States); German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig (German)
- National Inst. of Research and Development for Biological Sciences, Cluj-Napoca (Romania). Inst. of Biological Research
- Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States); Western Sydney Univ., Penrith, NSW (Australia)
- Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States); Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, Edgewater, MD (United States)
- Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE; German Research Foundation (DFG)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1546788
- Grant/Contract Number:
- FG02-07ER64456; 677232
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Nature Climate Change
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 7; Journal Issue: 12; Journal ID: ISSN 1758-678X
- Publisher:
- Nature Publishing Group
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; 59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Citation Formats
Schwarz, Benjamin, Barnes, Andrew D., Thakur, Madhav P., Brose, Ulrich, Ciobanu, Marcel, Reich, Peter B., Rich, Roy L., Rosenbaum, Benjamin, Stefanski, Artur, and Eisenhauer, Nico. Warming alters energetic structure and function but not resilience of soil food webs. United States: N. p., 2017.
Web. doi:10.1038/s41558-017-0002-z.
Schwarz, Benjamin, Barnes, Andrew D., Thakur, Madhav P., Brose, Ulrich, Ciobanu, Marcel, Reich, Peter B., Rich, Roy L., Rosenbaum, Benjamin, Stefanski, Artur, & Eisenhauer, Nico. Warming alters energetic structure and function but not resilience of soil food webs. United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-017-0002-z
Schwarz, Benjamin, Barnes, Andrew D., Thakur, Madhav P., Brose, Ulrich, Ciobanu, Marcel, Reich, Peter B., Rich, Roy L., Rosenbaum, Benjamin, Stefanski, Artur, and Eisenhauer, Nico. Mon .
"Warming alters energetic structure and function but not resilience of soil food webs". United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-017-0002-z. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1546788.
@article{osti_1546788,
title = {Warming alters energetic structure and function but not resilience of soil food webs},
author = {Schwarz, Benjamin and Barnes, Andrew D. and Thakur, Madhav P. and Brose, Ulrich and Ciobanu, Marcel and Reich, Peter B. and Rich, Roy L. and Rosenbaum, Benjamin and Stefanski, Artur and Eisenhauer, Nico},
abstractNote = {Climate warming is predicted to alter the structure, stability, and functioning of food webs. Yet, despite the importance of soil food webs for energy and nutrient turnover in terrestrial ecosystems, the effects of warming on these food webs—particularly in combination with other global change drivers—are largely unknown. Here, we present results from two complementary field experiments that test the interactive effects of warming with forest canopy disturbance and drought on energy flux in boreal–temperate ecotonal forest soil food webs. The first experiment applied a simultaneous above- and belowground warming treatment (ambient, +1.7 °C, +3.4 °C) to closed-canopy and recently clear-cut forest, simulating common forest disturbance6. The second experiment crossed warming with a summer drought treatment (-40% rainfall) in the clear-cut habitats. We show that warming reduces energy flux to microbes, while forest canopy disturbance and drought facilitates warming-induced increases in energy flux to higher trophic levels and exacerbates the reduction in energy flux to microbes, respectively. Contrary to expectations, we find no change in whole-network resilience to perturbations, but significant losses in ecosystem functioning. Warming thus interacts with forest disturbance and drought, shaping the energetic structure of soil food webs and threatening the provisioning of multiple ecosystem functions in boreal–temperate ecotonal forests.},
doi = {10.1038/s41558-017-0002-z},
journal = {Nature Climate Change},
number = 12,
volume = 7,
place = {United States},
year = {2017},
month = {11}
}
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