School of BioSciences, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, 3010, Australia.
School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Centre for Integrative Ecology, Deakin University, Waurn Ponds, Victoria, 3216, Australia.
Ecol Appl. 2021 Jun;31(4):e02302. doi: 10.1002/eap.2302. Epub 2021 Mar 18.
The relationship between metapopulation stability and connectivity has long been investigated in ecology, however, most of these studies are focused on theoretical species and habitat networks, having limited ability to capture the complexity of real-world metapopulations. Network analysis became more important in modeling connectivity, but it is still uncertain which network metrics are reliable predictors of persistence. Here we quantify the impact of connectivity and larval life history on marine metapopulation persistence across the complex seascape of southeast Australia. Our work coupled network-based approaches and eigenanalysis to efficiently estimate metapopulation-wide persistence and the subpopulation contributions. Larval dispersal models were used to quantify species-specific metapopulation connectivity for five important fisheries species, each summarized as a migration matrix. Eigenanalysis helped to reveal metapopulation persistence and determine the importance of node-level network properties. Across metapopulations, the number of local outgoing connections was found to have the largest impact on metapopulation persistence, implying these hub subpopulations may be the most influential in real-world metapopulations. Results also suggest the length of the pre-competency period may be the most influential parameter on metapopulation persistence. Finally, we identified two major hot spots of local connectivity in southeast Australia, each contributing strongly to multispecies persistence. Managers and ecologists would benefit by employing similar approaches in making more efficient and more ecologically informed decisions and focusing more on local connectivity patterns and larval competency characteristics to better understand and protect real-world metapopulation persistence. Practically this could mean developing more marine protected areas at shorter distances and supporting collaborative research into the early life histories of the species of interest.
长期以来，在生态学中一直研究了复合种群稳定性和连通性之间的关系，然而，这些研究大多集中在理论物种和栖息地网络上，对于捕获真实世界复合种群的复杂性的能力有限。网络分析在连通性建模中变得更加重要，但仍不确定哪些网络指标是持久性的可靠预测因子。在这里，我们在澳大利亚东南部复杂的海域环境中量化了连通性和幼虫生活史对海洋复合种群持久性的影响。我们的工作结合了基于网络的方法和特征分析，以有效地估计整个复合种群的持久性和亚种群的贡献。使用幼虫扩散模型来量化五个重要渔业物种的特定物种复合种群连通性，每个物种都总结为迁移矩阵。特征分析有助于揭示复合种群的持久性，并确定节点级网络属性的重要性。在整个复合种群中，发现本地传出连接数对复合种群持久性的影响最大，这意味着这些枢纽亚种群可能在现实世界的复合种群中最具影响力。结果还表明，预竞争期的长度可能是对复合种群持久性影响最大的参数。最后，我们确定了澳大利亚东南部两个主要的本地连通性热点，每个热点对多物种持久性都有很大的贡献。管理者和生态学家可以通过采用类似的方法，在做出更有效和更具生态意识的决策方面受益，并更多地关注本地连通性模式和幼虫竞争力特征，以更好地理解和保护现实世界的复合种群持久性。实际上，这可能意味着需要在更短的距离内建立更多的海洋保护区，并支持对感兴趣物种的早期生活史的合作研究。
