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Abstract

Ecological networks describe the complex set of interconnections among species and their environment, and network structure can inform the stability, resilience, and functioning of ecosystems. Increasing attention is being paid to the mechanisms that determine species interactions. Phylogeny has informed our understanding of connections within networks, mostly by describing the strength of phylogenetic conservation of interactions. Here, we examine how the phylogenetic position of a species relates to its functional position within a network, testing the relationship between phylogenetic and network topologies. Time period: Early 20th century to present. We used a large dataset of frugivore interactions to calculate partner degree and degree, and bird and plant phylogenies to calculate local evolutionary distinctiveness (ED), evolutionary distinctiveness calculated on a community-level phylogeny. We then fit binomial Bayesian models to estimate the effect of evolutionary distinctiveness on partner degree and degree, comparing the effects of known bird traits from AVONET. The partners of both high ED birds and plants are less likely to interact with other members of the community, and birds with high ED tend to interact with fewer plant species. In birds, the effect size of ED is comparable to or larger than measured bird traits. Our analysis illustrates how phylogenetic relationships affect present-day ecologies and underscores the unique ecological contribution of evolutionary outliers.

ZanneTreeTrim.tre and EricsonBirdTreeTrim.tre are trimmed versions of phylogenies from Zanne et al. 2014 and Jetz et al. 2014, respectively. Phylogenies were pruned to include only species represented in the Fricke and Svenning (2020) dataset.