Data from: Plant functional traits affect invertebrate predator diversity via bottom-up effects in a deadwood-based food web

Bottom-up effects play a critical role in shaping community
structure and trophic interactions within detritus-based food
webs. Coarse deadwood supports high biodiversity and
contributes to detrital food webs during its decomposition process.
Previous experiments have shown that wood functional traits have
significant impacts on detritivore communities. However, this effect has
rarely been tested on higher trophic levels, even less so relationships
between plant functional traits and predators via detritivores. In this
study, we investigated the effects of wood functional traits, synthesized
into the wood economics spectrum (WES), on the abundance and
diversity of detritivores and predators throughout the decomposition
process of 22 different tree species in eastern China. We hypothesized
that the WES has strong direct effects on detritivores and indirect
effects on predators as mediated by detritivores. We found that the WES
affected detritivore abundance and richness during early and intermediate
periods of decomposition, with tree species representing a
“resource-acquisitive” strategy having higher detritivore abundance and
diversity. The WES had almost no significant
direct effects on predator communities, while detritivore
abundance and richness had positive effects on predators. Thus, the WES
affected predator communities indirectly through detritivores,
yet with differences between sites and across decomposition
periods. Our study emphasizes the importance of “afterlife effects” of
wood traits for detrital food webs affecting not only detritivores but
also higher trophic levels and suggests that bottom-up effects are the
underlying mechanism. To effectively conserve biodiversity associated with
deadwood, forest management and restoration should prioritize maintaining
high tree species diversity covering the full wood economics spectrum,
ensuring diverse habitat and resource availability for multiple
invertebrate groups.