Species Co-occurrence Patterns and Mechanisms for <i>Rhyacophila</i> in High-Altitude Streams

Abstract

Currently, due to global warming, we are seeing large range shifts in many different species across the world. As these species shift they are encountering new species and new environments. The way that a species interacts with these new species and environments will determine its ability to expand its range, preventing extinction by being successful in this new environment. Rhyacophila is a genus of caddisflies, which belong to a group of terrestrial insects that complete their aquatic larval stage in cold, fast-flowing and highly oxygenated freshwater streams. Previous research has shown that the distribution and abundance of species in this genus vary greatly across streams in the Upper East River Basin in Gunnison, Colorado. In this study we wanted to determine if there were any species co-occurrence patterns that we could identify that would explain the distribution of these species. We also wanted to test potential mechanisms such as species interactions and environmental variables to see if they would explain these distribution patterns. We did find both positive and negative association patterns between various species. Rhyacophila alberta seemed to be negatively associated with Rhyacophila brunnea and weakly positively associated with Rhyacophila hyalinata. Both Rhyacophila alberta and Rhyacophila brunnea seem to have environmental preferences that were opposite of each other and Rhyacophila hyalinata seemed to fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. Using an experiment we tested whether or not predation and growth rates of Rhyacophila alberta were affected by the presence of species it commonly co-existed with compared to species it rarely co- occurred with. We did find effects on both predation rate and growth rate depending on treatment. However, predation rate did not predict growth rate. This experiment shows that species distributions can be influenced by both interspecific and intraspecific species interactions and environmental factors.

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