Skip to main content
Dryad

Data for: Space-for-time substitution reveals a hump-shaped distribution of dung beetles

Ancco Valdivia, Fernando1; Calixto, Eduardo1; Lopez, Evaristo2

Research facility: Entomology*
Published Jan 04, 2023 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.3xsj3txkr

Data files

Jan 04, 2023 version files 69.55 KB

Abstract

Unravelling how climate change impacts the diversity and distribution patterns of organisms is a major concern in ecology, especially with climate-sensitive species, such as dung beetles. Often found in warmer weather conditions, beetles are used as bio-indicators of environmental conditions. By using an altitudinal gradient as a proxy for climate change (i.e., space-for-time substitution), we assessed how changes in climatic variables, such as temperature and precipitation, impact patterns of dung beetles diversity and distribution in the Peruvian Andes. We recorded dung beetles diversity using three different types of baits, feces, carrion, and fruits, distributed in 18 pitfall traps in five different altitudinal sites (from 900 to 2500 m, 400 m apart from each other) in the rainy and dry seasons. We found that (i) dung beetles richness and abundance were influenced by the climate gradient, (ii) seasonality influenced beetle richness, which was high in the wet season, but did not influence abundance, (iii) dung beetle richness and abundance fit to a hump-shaped distribution pattern along the altitudinal gradient, and (iv) species richness is the beta diversity component that best describes the composition of dung beetle species along the altitudinal gradient. Our data show that the distribution and diversity of dung beetles are different at larger scales, with different patterns resulting from the response of species to both abiotic and biotic factors.