DOI: 10.5061/dryad.dfn2z35fq
title: Data from: Plant functional traits affect invertebrate predator diversity via bottom-up effects in a deadwood-based food web

description: Bottom-up effects play a critical role in shaping community
 structure and trophic interactions within detritus-based food
 webs. Coarse deadwood supports high biodiversity and
 contributes to detrital food webs during its decomposition process.
 Previous experiments have shown that wood functional traits have
 significant impacts on detritivore communities. However, this effect has
 rarely been tested on higher trophic levels, even less so relationships
 between plant functional traits and predators via detritivores. In this
 study, we investigated the effects of wood functional traits, synthesized
 into the wood economics spectrum (WES), on the abundance and
 diversity of detritivores and predators throughout the decomposition
 process of 22 different tree species in eastern China. We hypothesized
 that the WES has strong direct effects on detritivores and indirect
 effects on predators as mediated by detritivores. We found that the WES
 affected detritivore abundance and richness during early and intermediate
 periods of decomposition, with tree species representing a
 “resource-acquisitive” strategy having higher detritivore abundance and
 diversity. The WES had almost no significant
 direct effects on predator communities, while detritivore
 abundance and richness had positive effects on predators. Thus, the WES
 affected predator communities indirectly through detritivores,
 yet with differences between sites and across decomposition
 periods. Our study emphasizes the importance of “afterlife effects” of
 wood traits for detrital food webs affecting not only detritivores but
 also higher trophic levels and suggests that bottom-up effects are the
 underlying mechanism. To effectively conserve biodiversity associated with
 deadwood, forest management and restoration should prioritize maintaining
 high tree species diversity covering the full wood economics spectrum,
 ensuring diverse habitat and resource availability for multiple
 invertebrate groups.
description: # Data from: Plant functional traits affect invertebrate predator
 diversity via bottom-up effects in a deadwood-based food web
 `Ci_et_al_dataset.xlsx` includes the measured data of wood economic
 spectrums (PC1) based on the wood carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus
 concentration, lignin, cellulose concentration, and wood density, and
 detritivore and predator abundance and richness. ## Description of the
 data and file structure Column headers of the dataset of this data: * Tree
 species (Column A): Tree species' Latin names * site (Column B) :
 Incubation site * time (Column C): Decomposition duration * WDMC: Wood dry
 matter content (g/g) * WD: Wood density (g cm-3) * WN: Wood nitrogen
 concentration (mg/g) * WP: Wood phosphorus concentration (mg/g) * WL: Wood
 lignin concentration (%） * WCE: Wood cellulose concentration (%） *
 Wood_economics_spectrum: The values of the first principal component (PC1)
 after dimension reduction of six traits (wood nitrogen, phosphorus
 content, lignin, cellulose, wood density and wood dry matter content) of
 wood , representing the wood economic spectrum. * Detritivore_abundance:
 Abundance of detritivore invertebrates (excluding termites) *
 Predator_abundance: Abundance of predator invertebrates (excluding ants) *
 Detritivore_richness: Richness of detritivore invertebrates (excluding
 termites) * Predator_richness: Richness of predator invertebrates
 (excluding ants) * Termite_abundance: the abundance of termites *
 Ant_abundance: the abundance of ants * Termite_soil: Arcsine-transformed
 imported soil mass per volume by termites (g cm-3) * Mean_massloss%: The
 average mass loss percentage for each species during the incubation For
 additional information, please email Hang Ci or Enrong Yan
 ([cihangcaf@163.com](mailto:cihangcaf@163.com),
 [eryan@des.ecnu.edu.cn](mailto:eryan@des.ecnu.edu.cn)).