Effects of land-use change on functional and taxonomic diversity of Neotropical bats

Human land-use changes are particularly extensive in tropical
regions, representing one of the greatest threats to terrestrial
biodiversity and a key research topic in conservation. However, studies
considering the effects of different types of anthropogenic disturbance on
the functional dimension of biodiversity in human-modified landscapes are
rare. Here, we obtained data through an extensive review of peer-reviewed
articles and compared 30 Neotropical bat assemblages in well-preserved
primary forest and four different human-disturbed habitats in terms of
their functional and taxonomic diversity. We found that disturbed habitats
that are structurally less similar to primary forest (pasture, cropland and
early-stage secondary forest) were characterized by a lower functional and
taxonomic diversity, as well as community level-functional uniqueness.
These habitats generally retained fewer species that perform different
ecological functions compared to higher-quality landscape matrices, s...