Is Biodiversity Able to Buffer Ecosystems from Climate Change? What We Know and What We Don't

Abstract

Climate change alters ecosystems and their functioning, but biodiversity can buffer such changes. Previous syntheses suggest that biodiversity confers insurance; however, it is not clear whether this effect extends to climatic stressors. Here, we analyze 342 measures of the effects of biodiversity on stability in order to compare the response to climatic versus nonclimatic stressors. In general, the stabilizing effect of biodiversity is weaker for climatic than for nonclimatic stressors. We suggest that this reflects species pools being compiled at a small spatial scale for experiments testing climatic stressors. Some bias in the representation of biomes and stability metrics in biodiversity-climate studies may also distort the perceived effect of biodiversity on stability. We recommend that in future studies, researchers increase the spatial scale of experiments, manipulate multiple facets of biodiversity, simulate climate change in more realistic ways, and focus on underrepresented combinations of biomes and climatic stressors.