Integrating behavioral, population and large-scale approaches for understanding stream insect communities

Abstract

Stream insects are ubiquitous in running waters, show high diversity in terms of species numbers, form and function, have key roles in ecosystem processes, and are thereby important components of ecological research. Here, we emphasize that the integration of behavior, population-level processes and large-scale constraints, such as the history of the regional species pool, drainage basin morphology and environmental conditions, may be key to increasing our understanding of how stream insect communities are assembled. We argue that as an alternative to analyzing the species composition of whole insect communities, focusing on variation in the composition of behavioral trait groups is likely to provide increased understanding of how stream insect communities are assembled, thereby linking behavioral, population and community ecology.