A Unified Model Explaining the Unimodal Relationship Between Productivity and Species Richness in Fish Communities
Understanding the productivity-diversity relationship is central in ecology. While hypotheses exist for explaining positive and negative monotonic trends, they have never been combined into one model to account for hump-shaped patterns. Here, we propose a unified model integrating the more-individuals, biomass-driven competition and environmental filtering hypotheses. Analyzing fish communities along a eutrophication gradient, we reconstructed the observed hump-shaped curve between productivity and species richness. Two productivity-related variables explained richness: community size (positive effect) and zooplanktivorous fish biomass (negative effect). Zooplanktivores, overly favored by high productivity, likely competed with juvenile stages of other species for zooplankton, leading to species exclusions. This offers rare evidence for intensified species interactions along a productivity gradient in animal communities. Competition-driven loss thus precedes stress-induced losses (e.g., hypoxia), offering potential for early-warning protocols to monitor eutrophication.
Authors
- Yuedong Wang
- Qidong Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2082-8457)
- Tibor Erős (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2252-3115)
- Bernard Hugueny (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1843-5662)
- Jing Yuan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2095-4042)
- Kai Feng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6072-8763)
- Yahan Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5168-8082)
- Kun Tao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7661-9323)
- Xue Du (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9817-6888)
Institutions
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Université Fédérale de Toulouse Midi-Pyrénées (FR)
- Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
- Sichuan Agricultural University (CN)
- Institute of Hydrobiology (CN)
- HUN-REN Balaton Limnological Research Institute (HU)
- Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (FR)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Ecology Letters
- Published
- 2025-11-01
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.70256
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Aquatic Ecosystems and Phytoplankton Dynamics
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.86
Funders
- Laboratoire d'Excellence TULIP
- Agence Nationale de la Recherche
- National Natural Science Foundation of China
- Natural Science Foundation of Hubei Province
- Youth Innovation Promotion Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
- Youth Innovation Promotion Association