BIBLIOS

Tipo
Artigos em Revista

Tipo de Documento
Artigo Completo

Título
Specific sequence of arrival promotes coexistence via spatial niche pre‐emption by the weak competitor

Participantes na publicação
Inês Fragata (Author)
FACULDADE DE CIÊNCIAS DA UNIVERSIDADE DE LISBOA
Dep. Biologia Animal
cE3c
Raul Costa‐Pereira (Author)
Mariya Kozak (Author)
cE3c/FCUL
Agnieszka Majer (Author)
Oscar Godoy (Author)
Sara Magalhães (Author)
Dep. Biologia Animal
Dep. Biologia Animal
cE3c

Resumo
Historical contingency, such as the order of species arrival, can modify competitive outcomes via niche modification or pre-emption. However, how these mechanisms ultimately modify stabilising niche and average fitness differences remains largely unknown. By experimentally assembling two congeneric spider mite species feeding on tomato plants during two generations, we show that order of arrival affects species’ competitive ability and changes the outcome of competition. Contrary to expectations, order of arrival did not cause positive frequency dependent priority effects. Instead, coexistence was predicted when the inferior competitor (Tetranychus urticae) arrived first. In that case, T. urticae colonised the preferred feeding stratum (leaves) of T. evansi leading to spatial niche pre-emption, which equalised fitness and reduced niche differences, driving community assembly to a close-to-neutrality scenario. Our study demonstrates how the order of species arrival and the spatial context of competitive interactions may jointly determine whether species can coexist.


Suporte
Ecology Letters

Identificadores da Publicação
ISSN - 1461-023X

Editora
Wiley



Identificadores do Documento
DOI - https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.14021
URL - http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ele.14021

Identificadores de Qualidade
SCIMAGO Q1 (2022) - 5.673 - Ecology

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