Seasonal trends of saprophagous dung-inhabiting beetles, flies and their guilds in the combined data and data from both sites.

<p>Seasonal trends are presented for the combined data (A, B), data from the Czech Republic (C, D) and data from the United Kingdom (E, F). The fly patterns are represented by blue lines, the beetle patterns are represented by red lines. Dwellers = species whose larva develop in the dung pat, relocators = species whose larva develop outside of the dung pat.</p

Trends of dung-inhabiting beetle and fly abundances during succession (Czech Republic) and season (both sites).

<p>A) successional trends of dung-inhabiting beetles (solid red line) and fly larvae (dashed blue line) (data from the Czech Republic), B) seasonal trends of dung-inhabiting beetles (solid red line) and flies (dashed blue line) (data from both sites), C) seasonal trends of dung-inhabiting beetles (solid red line) and flies (data from the Czech Republic), D) seasonal trends of dung-inhabiting beetles (data from the United Kingdom), E) seasonal trends of dung-inhabiting flies (data from the United Kingdom),</p

Summary of individual functional group abundances in the combined seasonal data and in the successional data (from Czech Republic).

<p>Summary of individual functional group abundances in the combined seasonal data and in the successional data (from Czech Republic).</p

DCCA ordination diagrams of species seasonal segregation at both sites.

<p>Panels A, B and C represents the seasonal segregation of CZ species, all originating from one analyses (<i>F</i> = 12.6, <i>P</i> = 0.001). Those panels were created by including just one functional group for better visualization of results (A = saprophages (both adults and larvae coprophagous), B = omnivores (trophic switch between adults and larvae (usually adult saprophage, larva predator)), C = predators (= both adult and larvae predatory). Panel D represents the overall results of seasonal segregation in UK species (<i>F</i> = 17.3, <i>P</i> = 0.001). black squares = centroids of individual seasons (Espring = early spring (April–first half of May), Lspring = late spring (second half of May–June), Esummer = early summer (July), Lsummer = late summer (August–early days of September), Autumn = second half of September–October), diamonds = beetle species, stars = fly species, yellow symbols = relocators (larvae develop outside of the dung pat), green symbols = dwellers (larvae develop in the dung pats), blue symbols = omnivores, red symbols = predators, an asterisk (*) = the most abundant saprophage species in the UK data.</p

Seasonal trends of omnivorous and predatory dung-inhabiting beetles and flies in the combined data and the data from both sites.

<p>Seasonal trends are presented for the combined data (A, B), data from Czech Republic (C, D) and data from United Kingdom (E, F). The fly patterns are represented by blue lines, the beetle patterns are represented by red lines. Omnivores = trophic shift between adult and larva (adult usually saprophagous, larva predatory).</p

Results of GLMs testing the seasonal and successional trends of coprophilous insects.

<p>Results of GLMs testing the seasonal and successional trends of coprophilous insects.</p

Successional trends in dung-inhabiting beetles and flies.

<p>A) beetle (solid red line) and fly larvae (dashed blue line) saprophages (sap); B) beetle relocators and dwellers (solid red lines) and fly larvae (dashed blue line) saprophages (sap); C) beetle omnivorous larvae (omni: solid red line) and fly omnivorous larvae (omni: dashed blue line).</p

Life History Traits Reflect Changes in Mediterranean Butterfly Communities Due to Forest Encroachment

<div><p>The biodiversity of the Southern Balkans, part of the Mediterranean global biodiversity hot-spot, is threatened by land use intensification and abandonment, the latter causing forest encroachment of formerly open habitats. We investigated the impact of forest encroachment on butterfly species richness, community species composition and the representation of life history traits by repeated seasonal visits of 150 one-hectare sites in five separate regions in three countries—Greece, Bulgaria, and the Republic of Macedonia (FYROM—the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia)— 10 replicates for each habitat type of grasslands, open formations and scrub forest within each region. Grasslands and open formations sites hosted in average more species and more red-listed species than scrub forest, while no pattern was found for numbers of Mediterranean species. As shown by ordination analyses, each of the three habitat types hosted distinct butterfly communities, with Mediterranean species inclining either towards grasslands or open formations. Analysing the representation of life history traits revealed that successional development from grasslands and open formations towards scrub forest shifts the community composition towards species overwintering in earlier stages, having fewer generations per year, and inhabiting large European or Eurosiberian (e.g. northern) ranges; it decreases the representation of Mediterranean endemics. The loss of grasslands and semi-open formations due to forest encroachment thus threatens exactly the species that should be the focus of conservation attention in the Mediterranean region, and innovative conservation actions to prevent ongoing forest encroachment are badly needed.</p></div

Impact of <i>Forest encroachment</i> and <i>Canopy</i> on butterfly species richness (A-B) and Red-listed species (C-D) recorded during 2012–2013 from 150 sites in the Southern Balkans.

<p>The box plots show values of species richness (A) and Red-listed species (C) predicted by the generalised linear model (glm) with <i>Forest Encroachment</i> treated as 3-level factors, no covariates included. The lines in (B–D) show glm predicted values with <i>Canopy</i> covers treated as linear predictor after inclusion of covariates for Species Richness (B) and without covariates for Red-listed species (D). See <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0152026#pone.0152026.t001" target="_blank">Table 1</a> for details.</p

Results of Redundancy analyses analyzing butterfly species composition.

<p>Summary of single-term ordinations of predictors of interest (<i>Forest encroachment</i> and <i>Canopy)</i> and potential covariates (site characteristics and visit circumstances) as well as partial RDA ordinations assessing the effect of predictors of interest on butterfly species community composition (BSC) after controlling for site characteristics and visit circumstances (see <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0152026#sec002" target="_blank">Methods</a> for details).</p