The functional roles of species in metacommunities, as revealed by metanetwork analyses of bird-plant frugivory networks

Understanding how biodiversity and interaction networks change across environmental gradients is a major challenge in ecology. We integrated metacommunity and metanetwork perspectives to test species’ functional roles in bird-plant frugivory interactions in a fragmented forest landscape in Southwest China, with consequences for seed dispersal. Availability of fruit resources both on and under trees created vertical feeding stratification for frugivorous birds. Bird-plant interactions involving birds feeding only on the tree or both on and under the tree (shared) had a higher centrality and contributed more to metanetwork organization than interactions involving birds feeding only under the tree. Moreover, bird-plant interactions associated with large-seeded plants disproportionately contributed to metanetwork organization and centrality. Consequently, on-the-tree and shared birds contributed more to metanetwork organization whereas under-the-tree birds were more involved in local processes. We would expect that species’ roles in the metanetwork will translate into different conservation values for maintaining functioning of seed-dispersal networks.