Phenological sensitivity to climate across taxa and trophic levels

Thackeray, Stephen J., Henrys, Peter A., Hemming, Deborah , Bell, James R., Botham, Marc S., Burthe, Sarah, Helaouet, Pierre, Johns, David G., Jones, Ian D., Leech, David I., Mackay, Eleanor B., Massimino, Dario, Atkinson, Sian, Bacon, Philip J., Brereton, Tom M., Carvalho, Laurence, Clutton-Brock, Tim H., Duck, Callan, Edwards, Martin, Elliott, J. Malcolm, Hall, Stephen J. G., Harrington, Richard, Pearce-Higgins, James W., Høye, Toke T., Kruuk, Loeske E. B., Pemberton, Josephine M., Sparks, Tim H., Thompson, Paul M., White, Ian, Winfield, Ian J. and Wanless, Sarah (2016) Phenological sensitivity to climate across taxa and trophic levels. Nature, 535 (7611). pp. 241-245. ISSN 0028-0836

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Item Type:Article
Item Status:Live Archive

Abstract

Differences in phenological responses to climate change among species can desynchronise ecological interactions and thereby threaten ecosystem function. To assess these threats, we must quantify the relative impact of climate change on species at different trophic levels. Here, we apply a Climate Sensitivity Profile approach to 10,003 terrestrial and aquatic phenological data sets, spatially matched to temperature and precipitation data, to quantify variation in climate sensitivity. The direction, magnitude and timing of climate sensitivity varied markedly among organisms within taxonomic and trophic groups. Despite this variability, we detected systematic variation in the direction and magnitude of phenological climate sensitivity. Secondary consumers showed consistently lower climate sensitivity than other groups. We used mid-century climate change projections to estimate that the timing of phenological events could change more for primary consumers than for species in other trophic levels (6.2 versus 2.5–2.9 days earlier on average), with substantial taxonomic variation (1.1–14.8 days earlier on average).

Keywords:Phenology, Food webs
Subjects:C Biological Sciences > C180 Ecology
D Veterinary Sciences, Agriculture and related subjects > D300 Animal Science
Divisions:College of Science > School of Life Sciences
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ID Code:28290
Deposited On:04 Oct 2017 12:58

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