Ecography

Virtual Issues

The patterns and causes of elevational diversity gradients

Download this issue as a PDF

Understanding how and why diversity varies systematically with elevation has been a focus of research in spatial ecology since the days of the earliest naturalists. Indeed, over the past 25 years, Ecography has served as a key outlet for many of the studies examining the underlying causes of elevational diversity gradients. This Virtual Issue highlights some of the key papers that have had (or may have) lasting impressions on the field.

Read Editorial
Nathan J. Sanders and Carsten Rahbek

Elevational gradients, area and tropical island diversity: an example from the palms of New Guinea
Steven Bachman, William J. Baker, Neil Brummitt, John Dransfield, Justin Moat

Grasshopper populations across 2000 m of altitude: is there life history adaptation?
Daniel Berner, Christian Körner, Wolf U. Blanckenhorn

Unique elevational diversity patterns of geometrid moths in an Andean montane rainforest
Gunnar Brehm, Dirk Süssenbach, Konrad Fiedler

Change within and among forest communities: the influence of historic disturbance, environmental gradients, and community attributes
Windy A. Bunn, Michael A. Jenkins, Claire B. Brown, Nathan J. Sanders

Impact of warming and timing of snow melt on soil microarthropod assemblages associated with Dryas-dominated plant communities on Svalbard
Rebecca Dollery, Ian D. Hodkinson, Ingibjörg S. Jónsdóttir

From forest to pasture: an evaluation of the influence of environment and biogeography on the structure of beetle (Scarabaeinae) assemblages along three altitudinal gradients in the Neotropical region
Federico Escobar, Gonzalo Halffter, Lucrecia Arellano

Elevational patterns of frog species richness and endemic richness in the Hengduan Mountains, China: geometric constraints, area and climate effects
Cuizhang Fu, Xia Hua, Jun Li, Zheng Chang, Zhichao Pu, Jiakuan Chen

Latitudinal and elevational variation in fruiting phenology among western-European bird-dispersed plants
Marcelino Fuentes

Demographic processes of upward range contraction in a long-lived Mediterranean high mountain plant
Luis Giménez-Benavides, María José Albert, José María Iriondo, Adrián Escudero

Species-richness patterns of vascular plants along seven altitudinal transects in Norway
John Arvid Grytnes

The elevational gradient in Andean bird species richness at the local scale: a foothill peak and a high-elevation plateau
Sebastian K. Herzog, Michael Kessler, Kerstin Bach

Area, altitude and aquatic plant diversity
J. Iwan Jones, Wei Li, Stephen C. Maberly

Assemblage structure and quantitative habitat relations of small mammals along an ecological gradient in the Colorado Desert of southern California
Douglas A. Kelt

The impact of sterile populations on the perception of elevational richness patterns in ferns
Michael Kessler, Sandra Hofmann, Thorsten Krömer, Daniele Cicuzza, Jürgen Kluge

Can we predict butterfly diversity along an elevation gradient from space?
Oded Levanoni, Noam Levin, Guy Pe'er, Anne Turbé, Salit Kark

Elevational gradients in phylogenetic structure of ant communities reveal the interplay of biotic and abiotic constraints on diversity
Antonin Machac, Milan Janda, Robert R. Dunn, Nathan J. Sanders

Interannual changes in folivory and bird insectivory along a natural productivity gradient in northern Patagonian forests
C. Noemi Mazía, Thomas Kitzberger, Enrique J. Chaneton

The altitudinal gradient of vascular plant richness in Aurland, western Norway
Arvid Odland, H. J. B. Birks

Evaluating alternative data sets for ecological niche models of birds in the Andes
Juan L. Parra, Catherine C. Graham, Juan F. Freile

The elevational gradient of species richness - a uniform pattern
Carsten Rahbek

Altitude and woody cover control recruitment of Helleborus foetidus in a Mediterranean mountain area
José M. Ramírez, Pedro J. Rey, Julio M. Alcántara, Alfonso M. Sánchez-Lafuente

Community structure of crustacean zooplankton in subarctic ponds - effects of altitude and physical heterogeneity
Milla Rautio

The region effect on mesoscale plant species richness between eastern Asia and eastern North America
Robert E. Ricklefs, Hong Qian, Peter S. White

An indirect area effect on elevational species richness patterns
Tom S. Romdal, John-Arvid Grytnes

Environmental and geometric drivers of small mammal diversity along elevational gradients in Utah
Rebecca J. Rowe

Why do mountains support so many species of birds?
Adriana Ruggiero, Bradford A. Hawkins

Environmental correlates of mammal species richness in South America: effects of spatial structure, taxonomy and geographic range
Adriana Ruggiero, Thomas Kitzberger

Elevational gradients in ant species richness: area, geometry, and Rapoport's rule
Nathan J. Sanders

Relative importance of climate vs local factors in shaping the regional patterns of forest plant richness across northeast China
Xiangping Wang, Jingyun Fang, Nathan J. Sanders, Peter S. White, Zhiyao Tang