ArticlePeerJ2022
Galapagos land iguanas as ecosystem engineers.
Article in PeerJ, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
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Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed, 4 citations in OpenAlex.
- Defaunation and species introductions alter long-term functional trait diversity in insular reptiles.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
2 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundDeclines of large-bodied herbivorous reptiles are well documented, but the consequences for ecosystem function are not. Understanding how large-bodied herbivorous reptiles engineer ecosystems is relevant given the current interest in restoration of tropical islands where extinction rates are disproportionately high and reptiles are prominent as herbivores.
methodsIn this study, we measured the ecosystem-level outcomes of long-term quasi-experiment represented by two adjacent islands within the Galapagos Archipelago, one with and the other without Galapagos land iguanas (
resultsIn the presence of iguanas there was dramatically less woody plant cover, more area with seasonal grasses, and many fewer cacti. Cacti had a more clumped distribution where iguanas were absent than where iguanas were present. DISCUSSION: This study provided strong evidence that Galapagos land iguanas can substantially engineer the structure of terrestrial plant communities; therefore, restoration of large-bodied reptilian herbivores, such as land iguanas and giant tortoises, should be regarded as an important component of overall ecosystem restoration, especially for tropical islands from which they have been extirpated.
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