What defines insularity for plants in edaphic islands?

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Authors

MENDEZ-CASTRO Francisco E. CONTI Luisa CHYTRÝ Milan JIMÉNEZ-ALFARO Borja HÁJEK Michal HORSÁK Michal ZELENÝ David MALAVASI Marco OTTAVIANI Gianluigi

Year of publication 2021
Type Article in Periodical
Magazine / Source Ecography
MU Faculty or unit

Faculty of Science

Citation
Web https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.05650
Doi http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ecog.05650
Keywords terrestrial island-like system; island biogeography; island size; isolation; specialist species richness; target effect
Description The theory of island biogeography postulates that size and isolation are key drivers of biodiversity on islands. This theory has been applied not only to true (e.g. oceanic) islands but also to terrestrial island-like systems (e.g. edaphic islands). Recently, a debate has opened as to whether terrestrial island-like systems function like true islands. However, identifying the effect of insularity in terrestrial systems is conceptually and methodologically challenging because recognizing species source(s) and measuring isolation is not as straightforward as for true islands. We contribute to the debate by proposing an approach to contextualize the definition of insularity and to identify the role of isolation in terrestrial island-like systems. To test this approach, we explored the relationship between insularity predictors and specialist species richness of edaphic islands in three systems in Europe (spring fens, mountaintops, and outcrops). We detected that insularity affected specialist richness of edaphic islands through island size and target effect (i.e. an emergent property of islands depending on their isolation and size). As predicted by the Theory of Island Biogeography, species richness decreased with increasing isularity. Given the comprehensiveness and ease of implementation of our approach, we encourage its extension to other island-like systems.
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