Data from: Long-term climate and hydrologic regimes shape stream invertebrate community responses to a hurricane disturbance

Disturbances can produce a spectrum of short- and long-term ecological
consequences that depend on complex interactions of the characteristics of
the event, antecedent environmental conditions, and the intrinsic
properties of resistance and resilience of the affected biological system.
We used Hurricane Harvey’s impact on coastal rivers of Texas to examine
the roles of storm-related changes in hydrology and long-term
precipitation regime on the response of stream invertebrate communities to
hurricane disturbance. We detected declines in richness, diversity, and
total abundance following the storm, but responses were strongly tied to
direct and indirect effects of long-term aridity and short-term changes in
stream hydrology. The amount of rainfall a site received drove both flood
duration and flood magnitude across sites, but lower annual rainfall
amounts (i.e., aridity) increased flood magnitude and decreased flood
duration. Across all sites, flood duration was positively related to the
time it took for invertebrate communities to return to a long-term
baseline and flood magnitude drove larger invertebrate community responses
(i.e., changes in diversity and total abundance). However, invertebrate
response per unit flood magnitude was lower in sub-humid sites,
potentially because of differences in refuge availability or
ecological-evolutionary interactions. Interestingly, sub-humid streams had
temporary large peaks in invertebrate total abundance and diversity
following recovery period that may be indicative of the larger organic
matter pulses expected in these systems because of their comparatively
well-developed riparian vegetation. Our findings show that hydrology and
long-term precipitation regime predictably affected invertebrate community
responses and, thus, our work underscores the important influence of local
climate to ecosystem sensitivity to disturbances.

生态扰动（disturbances）可产生一系列短期与长期的生态后果，其取决于扰动事件特征、前期环境条件（antecedent environmental conditions）以及受影响生物系统固有的抗性（resistance）与恢复力（resilience）之间的复杂相互作用。本研究以飓风哈维（Hurricane Harvey）对德克萨斯州沿海河流的影响为研究对象，探讨了风暴相关的水文（hydrology）变化与长期降水格局（precipitation regime）如何调控溪流无脊椎动物群落（stream invertebrate communities）对飓风扰动的响应。我们检测到风暴过后，群落的物种丰富度、多样性及总个体丰度均出现下降，但群落响应与长期干旱度、溪流水文短期变化的直接及间接效应密切相关。样地的降雨量决定了各地的洪水持续时长（flood duration）与洪水强度（flood magnitude）；而较低的年降雨量（即较高的干旱度）会增大洪水强度，同时缩短洪水持续时长。在所有样地中，洪水持续时长与无脊椎动物群落恢复至长期基线水平所需的时间呈正相关，而洪水强度则驱动了更显著的无脊椎动物群落响应，即多样性与总个体丰度的变化。不过，半湿润样地（sub-humid sites）中，单位洪水强度对应的无脊椎动物响应程度更低，这可能与避难所可获得性（refuge availability）的差异或是生态-进化互作（ecological-evolutionary interactions）有关。值得注意的是，半湿润溪流在恢复阶段后会出现无脊椎动物总个体丰度与多样性的临时性峰值，这可能反映了这类系统中预期出现的更强有机质脉冲（organic matter pulses）——这源于其相对发育良好的河岸植被（riparian vegetation）。我们的研究结果表明，水文过程与长期降水格局可规律性地调控无脊椎动物群落的响应；因此，本研究强调了局地气候对生态系统敏感性（ecosystem sensitivity）的重要影响。