种群内遗传多样性的数量会影响种群的生态过程,社区,和生态系统水平。然而,幅度,一致性,这些影响的范围在很大程度上是未知的。为了调查这些问题,我们进行了两个实验,操纵了幼虫两栖动物的遗传多样性和环境因素。第一个实验操纵了木蛙的遗传多样性,是否存在笼中的捕食者,以及豹蛙的竞争来测试这些因素是否影响生存,增长,木蛙和豹蛙的形态。第二个实验操纵了木蛙的遗传多样性,存在或不存在未捕获的捕食者,和资源丰度,以测试这些因素是否影响木蛙性状(存活率,形态学,增长,发展,和行为)和生态群落的其他组成部分(浮游动物丰度,浮游植物,附生植物,和细菌群落结构)。遗传多样性不影响木蛙的存活,增长,以及在任何一个实验中的发展。然而,遗传多样性确实影响了第一个实验中木蛙t的平均形态和第二个实验中浮游动物的丰度和分布。它没有影响浮游植物的丰度,附生植物丰度,或细菌群落结构。虽然遗传多样性的效应大小(科恩的d)大约是环境处理的一半,最大的效应大小是遗传多样性与环境之间的相互作用效应。我们的结果表明,遗传多样性可以对生态过程产生很大的影响,但是这些影响的方向高度依赖于环境条件,并且不容易从简单的特征测量中预测。
The amount of genetic diversity within a population can affect ecological processes at population, community, and ecosystem levels. However, the magnitude, consistency, and scope of these effects are largely unknown. To investigate these issues, we conducted two experiments manipulating the amount of genetic diversity and environmental factors in larval amphibians. The first experiment manipulated wood frog genetic diversity, the presence or absence of caged predators, and competition from leopard frogs to test whether these factors affected survival, growth, and morphology of wood frogs and leopard frogs. The second experiment manipulated wood frog genetic diversity, the presence or absence of uncaged predators, and resource abundance to test whether these factors affected wood frog traits (survival, morphology, growth, development, and behavior) and other components of the ecological community (zooplankton abundance, phytoplankton, periphyton, and bacterial community structure). Genetic diversity did not affect wood frog survival, growth, and development in either experiment. However, genetic diversity did affect the mean morphology of wood frog tadpoles in the first experiment and the abundance and distribution of zooplankton in the second experiment. It did not affect phytoplankton abundance, periphyton abundance, or bacterial community structure. While effect sizes (Cohen\'s d) of genetic diversity were approximately half those of environment treatments, the greatest effect sizes were for interaction effects between genetic diversity and environment. Our results indicate that genetic diversity can have a large effect on ecological processes, but the direction of those effects is highly dependent upon environmental conditions, and not easily predicted from simple measures of traits.