Plant-centred sampling estimates higher dissimilarity of interactions
than pollinator-based sampling across habitats
- Camila Souza,
- Pietro Maruyama,
- Karen Santos,
- isabela varasin,
- Caroline Gross,
- Andrea Araujo
Abstract
When describing plant-animal networks, sampling can be performed using
plant- or animal-centred approaches. Importantly, while the method
affects the characterisation of network structure, how it may affect
estimates of interaction dissimilarity across networks is still unknown.
Here, we investigated how sampling affects the characterization of
pollination networks and their dissimilarities across habitats in a
heterogeneous tropical landscape. We also asked whether plant traits
influence the difference in interaction specialization according to
sampling. Plant-centred networks reported higher interaction and species
dissimilarity in space, mainly due to interaction rewiring, while
animal-centred networks showed higher specialization and modularity.
Floral type and pollination systems affected how specialization was
influenced by the sampling method. Combining animal- and plant-centred
approaches returned intermediate values for dissimilarity and network
metrics, indicating that complementary methods should be used for a
better characterization of interaction networks, especially those
including groups with distinct mobilities, such as plant and
pollinators.