Rapoport's rule: time for an epitaph?

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Abstract

The christening of the decline in the geographic extent of species from high to low latitudes as Rapoport's rule was a bold step. Allowing for a variety of potentially significant complications to the interpretation of empirical studies, evidence that this is indeed a general pattern is, at the very least, equivocal. The present taxonomically and regionally biased set of studies lend support to the recent suggestion that the pattern is a local phenomenon being expressed primarily in the Palaearctic and Nearctic above latitudes of 40-50°N. Five hypotheses have been proposed to explain the generation of latitudinal declines in range size where they do occur, with the past heavy emphasis on a climatic variability mechanism being eroded. Evidence is accruing in support of more than one such mechanism. Whatever the generality of the `rule', it has undoubtedly served to stimulate a consideration of the role of spatial variation in range sizes in several areas of research in ecology and evolution.

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Most cited references 32

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The elevational gradient in altitudinal range: an extension of Rapoport's latitudinal rule to altitude.

G Stevens (1992)

For trees, mammals, birds, reptiles, insects, and amphibians, the species richness on mountaintops is generally less than that of lowland areas. Coincident with this decline in species richness with increasing elevation is an increase in the altitudinal range of species. This pattern is analogous to the relationship between the latitudinal range of species and latitude (Rapoport's latitudinal rule). Both of these Rapoport phenomena, the latitudinal and the new elevational rule discussed here, can be explained as being results of differences in the breadth of climatic conditions organisms experience along the geographical gradients. The influence of latitudinal or altitudinal range size on local species richness is poorly understood, but the tendency for range margins to fall in species-rich, rather than species-poor, areas may mean that species-rich communities contain many species that are maintained only through immigration. The presence of these persistent but locally non-self-maintaining populations may explain the increased number of species found in rich communities as compared to species-poor communities without the need to invoke other differences in local species interactions.

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Nonbiological Gradients in Species Richness and a Spurious Rapoport Effect

George C Hurtt, Robert K. Colwell (1994)

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The relationship among area, elevation, and regional species richness in neotropical birds.

C Rahbek (1997)

The elevational gradient of species richness is often claimed to mirror the latitudinal gradient and has traditionally been explained by assuming a decrease in productivity with elevation and more recently by Rapoport's rule. The influence of area on the pattern has rarely been considered. Analyses of all South American tropical land birds (more than one-fourth of the extant bird species on Earth) are used to examine four species richness/elevation models: null model, Rapoport's rule, and monotonic or hump-shaped productivity/species richness relationships. To quantify the area effect, species-area curves were created for seven elevational zones. Not accounting for area, species richness declined monotonically with elevation, but area accounted for 67%-91% of the variation in species richness per zone. When area was factored out, a hump-shaped pattern emerged, with more species in the 500-1,000-m (P<.005) and 1,000-1,500-m zones (P<.10) than in the 0-500-m zone. Rapoport's rule and the monotonic productivity/species richness relationship were thus not supported. Instead, elevational turnover rates and numbers of shared species between zones suggested that the hump-shaped pattern reflects geometric constraints (as predicted by the null model) imposed by the narrow span of the gradient, and it is suggested that midelevational zones may represent sink habitats.

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Author and article information

Journal

Title: Trends in Ecology & Evolution

Abbreviated Title: Trends in Ecology & Evolution

Publisher: Elsevier BV

ISSN (Print): 01695347

Publication date Created: February 1998

Publication date (Print): February 1998

Volume: 13

Issue: 2

Pages: 70-74

Article

DOI: 10.1016/S0169-5347(97)01236-6

PubMed ID: 21238203

SO-VID: f0e81d2d-3eda-49c5-8492-f56b036361ba

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https://www.elsevier.com/tdm/userlicense/1.0/

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