Trait mediation explains decadal distributional shifts for a wide range of insect taxa
Shifts in insect distributions have been reported globally, largely attributed to climate and landscape changes. Communities are being reshaped, with species response traits mediating the effects of changing environments. Using a machine-learning approach we model 1252 insect occupancies across three decades in Great Britain. We combine independent models of nine insect groups (butterflies, moths, odonates, orthopterans, carabids, ladybirds, bees, wasps and hoverflies) to take a high-level view of the trends and key environmental drivers of insect occupancy, as well as to highlight the trait mediations underlying the resulting niches. Across this wide taxonomic range, we identify common trends in insect occupancies, showing no Great Britain-wide decline since 1990, but instead local declines and changes in community compositions. Known drivers of biodiversity loss appear to underlie those changes, notably urban sprawl and landscape simplification. Our approach also highlights the crucial roles of two response traits: habitat breadth, in mediating the effects of changing landscapes diversity and voltinism, in mediating the effects of increasing temperatures on insect life cycles.
Authors
- Alice E. Milne (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4509-0578)
- Richard Fox (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6992-3522)
- C. R. Shortall (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7175-5393)
- Luke C. Evans (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8649-0589)
- Björn C. Beckmann (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9918-3198)
- Rowan Edwards
- William E. Kunin (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9812-2326)
- Marc S. Botham (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5276-1405)
- Stuart P. M. Roberts (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5473-4718)
- Christopher W. Foster (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7635-6797)
- Christopher Hassall (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3510-0728)
- James R. Bell (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1640-6120)
- Yoann Bourhis (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9365-9597)
- Clare S. Rowland (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0459-506X)
- Dan Blumgart (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2591-7686)
- Martin C.D. Speight
Institutions
- University of Leeds (GB)
- Butterfly Conservation (GB)
- Trinity College Dublin (IE)
- Rothamsted Research (GB)
- UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (GB)
- Midhurst Community Hospital (GB)
- Keele University (GB)
- University of Reading (GB)
- British Trust for Ornithology (GB)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Nature Communications
- Published
- 2025-08-30
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-63093-y
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Plant and animal studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 3.03
Funders
- NERC Environmental Bioinformatics Centre
- Directorate for Biological Sciences