Classification of biodiversity indicators based on context-dependent
dynamics: A case study of a coastal fish community
Abstract
Species richness, evenness, and taxonomic diversity have been proposed
and used as indicators of biodiversity. However, the governing equations
for the dynamics of these indicators are often unknown and an
understanding of their mechanism is limited. By employing a nonlinear
forecasting-based method to the time series of 10 biodiversity
indicators of a marine fish community, we aimed to detect changes in
their dynamics and classify the indicators according to the level and
timing of dynamic changes. The 10 biodiversity indicators were
classified into three super-groups: Group I (species richness and
community center of distribution) with the most unchanged dynamics;
Group II (species diversity and total abundance) with dynamics that had
an abrupt change in the middle, presumably due to an increase in local
temperature; and Group III (species evenness) with highly variable
dynamics. Finally, a hypothesis regarding the mechanistic basis of the
dynamic similarities between the biodiversity indicators was proposed.