Spatio-temporal determinants of arthropod biodiversity across an
agro-ecosystem landscape
Abstract
Arthropod communities globally are declining while undergoing taxonomic
and functional homogenization, with agricultural activity being a strong
contributory factor. Here we use DNA metabarcoding to quantify how
variation in climate, agricultural intensity, and plant community
composition shape spatiotemporal variation in a metacommunity of
> 10,000 arthropod species sampled from 29 Malaise traps
across 15 sites in southern Ontario, Canada. Local variation in plant
community composition and canopy cover best explained arthropod
community dissimilarity. Climatic variables followed closely as
explanatory factors, driven primarily by seasonal variation in
temperature. The proportion of agricultural land at the landscape scale
had no detectable effect. Our results suggest that plant community
composition, microclimate, and seasonality structured the arthropod
metacommunity to considerable degree, factors that are rarely
incorporated into assessments of biodiversity loss due to agriculture.
We conclude that habitat restoration on marginal lands is likely an
effective strategy for promoting arthropod biodiversity in
agroecosystems.