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Giving-up diversity (GUDiv): top-down effects of foraging decisions on local, landscape and regional biodiversity of resources
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  • Jana Eccard,
  • Clara Ferreira,
  • Andres Peredo Arce,
  • Melanie Dammhahn
Jana Eccard
University of Potsdam

Corresponding Author:eccard@uni-potsdam.de

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Clara Ferreira
University of Potsdam
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Andres Peredo Arce
University of Potsdam
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Melanie Dammhahn
Universitat Potsdam
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Abstract

Foraging by consumers has direct effects on the community of their resource species, and may serve as a biotic filtering mechanism of diversity. Determinants of foraging behaviour may thus have cascading effects on abundance, diversity, and functional trait composition of the resource community. Here we propose giving-up diversity (GUDiv) as a novel concept and simple measure to quantify community effects of foraging at multiple spatial diversity scales. GUDiv provides a framework linking theories of adaptive foraging behaviour with community ecology. In experimental resource landscapes we showcase effects of patch residency of foraging wild rodents on α-GUDiv, ß-GUDiv and γ- GUDiv, and on functional trait composition of resources. Using GUDiv allows for prediction-based investigation of cascading indirect predation effects (ecology of fear) across multiple trophic levels, of feedbacks between functional trait composition of resource and consumer communities, and of effects of inter-individual differences among foragers on the diversity of resource communities.