Macro- and microclimate interactively shape species diversity of multiple taxa in mountain landscapes

Macroclimate is a key driver of biodiversity, but habitat conditions can modulate the local microclimate by amplifying or buffering macroclimatic temperatures. The interplay between microclimatic modulation and macroclimatic temperature is crucial for shaping local biodiversity in a warming world, but remains poorly understood across life forms. We examined how macroclimate and microclimatic modulation jointly shape alpha diversity across eight taxonomic groups. We surveyed multi-taxon biodiversity along gradients of macroclimate (elevation) and microclimatic modulation (habitat structure), focusing on soil bacteria, soil fungi, understory plants, ground-dwelling arthropods, moths, flying insects, bats, and birds. We hypothesized that alpha diversity would increase with temperature at both macro- and microclimatic scales, with strongest effects for immobile and ectothermic groups, and that microclimatic effects would be more pronounced in thermally constrained (cold) macroclimates. Cont..., We conducted a multi-taxon biodiversity survey along orthogonal gradients of macroclimate (i.e., elevation) and microclimatic modulation (associated with a series of habitat types from sparsely vegetated to closed forest) at Berchtesgaden National Park. We then used Hill numbers and Generalized Additive Models to study the interactive effects of macroclimatic mean summer temperature and microclimatic modulation (i.e., buffering/amplification of ambient temperatures) on alpha diversity of taxa with different thermoregulatory strategies.
For details, see the Methods section and Supporting Information of the related article.
, , # Data from: Interactive effects of macro- and microclimate on species diversity

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.3ffbg79v2](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.3ffbg79v2)

## Description of the data and file structure

The provided dataset contains the original input data and scripts used to study interactive effects of macro- and microclimate on alpha diversity across taxonomic groups.

The present datasets contain the relevant scripts, input data, and results.

## Description of the data and file structure:

We conducted our analyses in R 4.5.0 (R Core Team 2025). We only used open source packages available on CRAN and GitHub. All analysis was conducted within one R project, which comes with a set workspace and relative folder paths, ensuring input data can be accessed with the provided code on all devices. We thus recommend to open the scripts directly via the R project by first opening the Rproj-file (*01_analysis_revised.Rproj*) and to follow the following folder structure:

MAIN_FOLDER ...,