邻近栖息地交换资源

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生态学家长期以来观察到邻近栖息地之间的资源转移。但他们认为这种交易在很大程度上是不对称的,资源从生产力较高的栖息地流向生产力较低的栖息地。例如,在相邻的森林和溪流栖息地的情况下,人们认为森林在需要时维持溪流。但是,昨天发表在《美国国家科学院院刊》上的一项新研究表明,这种关系比以前认为的要互惠得多。京都大学生态学家中野繁(Shigeru Nakano,去年春天去世)和北海道大学的村上正志(Masashi Murakami)进行的为期两年的研究结果表明,森林在夏季为溪流提供食物,而溪流在春季和秋季为森林提供食物。具体而言,当夏季水生食物供应处于最低水平时,溪流中的鱼类捕食森林无脊椎动物。然而,在春季和秋季,当树叶稀疏时,森林鸟类必须转向水生无脊椎动物觅食。“作者总结说,“栖息地之间互惠资源补贴的重要性表明,一个栖息地的丧失或退化可能对邻近群落产生比我们以前认识到的更不利的影响。”

Kate Wong is an award-winning science writer and senior editor at 大众科学 focused on evolution, ecology, anthropology, archaeology, paleontology and animal behavior. She is fascinated by human origins, which she has covered for more than 25 years. Recently she has become obsessed with birds. Her reporting has taken her to caves in France and Croatia that Neandertals once called home, to the shores of Kenya's Lake Turkana in search of the oldest stone tools in the world, to Madagascar on an expedition to unearth ancient mammals and dinosaurs, to the icy waters of Antarctica, where humpback whales feast on krill, and on a "Big Day" race around the state of Connecticut to find as many bird species as possible in 24 hours. Kate is co-author, with Donald Johanson, of Lucy's Legacy: The Quest for Human Origins. She holds a bachelor of science degree in biological anthropology and zoology from the University of Michigan. Follow Wong on X (formerly Twitter) @katewong

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