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Assessing habitat fragmentation on marine epifaunal macroinvertebrate communities: an experimental approach

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Abstract

Habitat fragmentation is considered a major cause of biodiversity loss, both on terrestrial and marine environments. Understanding the effects of habitat fragmentation on the structure and dynamics of natural communities is extremely important to support management actions for biodiversity conservation. However, the effects of habitat fragmentation on marine communities are still poorly understood. Here we evaluated whether habitat fragmentation affects the structure of epifaunal communities in the sublittoral zone, in the northern coast of São Paulo state, Brazil. Five experimental landscapes were constructed, each one forming a large continuous patch. After 4 weeks, each landscape was cut on three patches of different sizes. Epifaunal macroinvertebrate communities were sampled at the edge and interior of experimental landscapes before manipulation to evaluate edge effects. After four more weeks, communities from the three patch sizes were also sampled to evaluate patch size effects. We compared the diversity of communities at different levels of fragmentation by total abundance, rarefied taxon richness, Shannon–Wiener diversity index, Simpson’s dominance index, and abundance of dominant taxa. Higher taxon richness and gastropod abundance were recorded in the patch edges, but no significant differences were found among patch sizes. We found a significant effect of habitat fragmentation, with lower abundances of Gammaridea (the dominant taxon), Ophyuroidea, and Pycnogonida after the experimental fragmentation. Lower abundances of dominant taxa resulted in higher diversity and lower dominance in fragmented landscapes when compared to integral, pre-manipulation landscapes. Our results suggest that fragmentation of landscapes in the system studied can reduce dominance, and that even small patch sizes can be important for the conservation of macroinvertebrate diversity.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank CAPES for the financial support, CNPq for a grant to M. O. Tanaka (Proc. 308630/2010-6), the staff of the Research Base “Clarimundo de Jesus” at the Institute of Oceanography of the University of São Paulo, mainly to Manoel da Cruz, Ayrton Pasquini and Fernando dos Santos, and contributions to an earlier version of the manuscript made by Luciano L. Elsinor, Luiz Eduardo Moschini, Angela Fushita, José Salatiel R. Pires, and Milton C. Ribeiro.

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  1. Graduate Program in Ecology and Natural Resources, Federal University of São Carlos, Rodovia Washington Luiz km 235, CP 676, São Carlos, SP, 13565-905, Brazil

    Ana Beatriz Pierri-Daunt

  2. Department of Environmental Sciences - DCAm, Federal University of São Carlos, Rodovia Washington Luiz km 235, CP 676, São Carlos, SP, 13565-905, Brazil

    Marcel O. Tanaka

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  1. Ana Beatriz Pierri-Daunt
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Correspondence to Ana Beatriz Pierri-Daunt.

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Pierri-Daunt, A.B., Tanaka, M.O. Assessing habitat fragmentation on marine epifaunal macroinvertebrate communities: an experimental approach. Landscape Ecol 29, 17–28 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-013-9970-1

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