Manuel Nogales

Spanish National Research Council | CSIC

We provide an overview of the current state of knowledge of island frugivory and seed dispersal and identify knowledge gaps that are important for fundamental research on—and applied conservation of—island ecosystems. We conducted a systematic literature search of frugivory and seed dispersal on islands, omitting large, continental islands. This re...

Understanding how biotic interactions shape ecosystems and impact their functioning, resilience and biodiversity has been a sustained research priority in ecology. Yet, traditional assessments of ecological complexity typically focus on species-species interactions that mediate a particular function (e.g., pollination), overlooking both the synergi...

Climate change is forcing species to shift their distribution ranges. Animal seed dispersers might be particularly important in assisting plants tracking suitable climates to higher elevations. However, this role is still poorly understood due to a lack of comprehensive multi‐guild datasets along elevational gradients. We compiled seed dispersal ne...

On the island of La Palma, located in the Canary Islands, Spain, the Canary pine forest is largely unmanaged and depends on natural regeneration for sustainable population dynamics. Canary pine (Pinus canariensis C.Sm. ex DC.) has been continuously exposed to volcanic eruptions over evolutionary time scales. The species exhibits many adaptations to...

Una de las principales consecuencias ecológicas del declive de la biodiversidad es la pérdida de interacciones mutualistas tales como la dispersión de semillas. Tras casi 2000 años de uso humano intensivo del bosque de cedro canario (Juniperus cedrus) en el Parque Nacional del Teide (cumbre de Tenerife, islas Canarias), esta formación se encuentra...

Within vertebrates, reptiles are good island colonisers, often leading to considerable levels of intraspecific diversity among populations inhabiting different islands/archipelagos. This study explores the mitochondrial phylogeographic structure of Tarentola boettgeri, a gecko species endemic to the Macaronesian archipelagos of Selvagens and Canary...

Volcanic eruptions have a strong environmental impact on surrounding forests. Trees are affected by mechanical damage, tephra deposition and volcanic gases. Oceanic islands are shaped by relatively frequent volcanic eruptions and thus offer the opportunity to study the effect of volcanic activity on biodiversity. We investigate the impact of volcan...

In 2021, the Tajogaite Volcano erupted along the western slope of the Cumbre Vieja on the island of La Palma, Canary Islands, Spain. Volcanic tephra blanketed a substantial proportion of the island. By our estimations, approximately 23,000,000 m3 of pyroclastic ashes and more coarse-grained particles were deposited unto La Palma’s land surface in a...

Invasive alien species have widespread impacts on native biodiversity and ecosystem services. Since the number of introductions worldwide is continuously rising, it is essential to prevent the entry, establishment and spread of new alien species through a systematic examination of future potential threats. Applying a three-step horizon scanning con...

Understanding how biotic interactions affect ecosystem functioning has been a research priority in natural sciences due to their critical role in bolstering ecological resilience. Yet, traditional assessment of ecological complexity typically focus on species-species effective interactions that mediate a particular function (e.g. pollination or see...

The high proportion of woody plant species on oceanic islands has hitherto been explained mainly by gradual adaptation to climatic conditions. Here, we present a novel hypothesis that such woodiness is adaptative to volcanic ash (tephra) deposition. Oceanic islands are subject to frequent eruptions with substantial and widespread ash deposition on...

This note reports a trophic interaction of a passerine consuming lichens. On the islet of Daphne Major (Galápagos Archipelago), we made five observations of the Large Ground-Finch Geospiza magnirostris eating the fruticose lichen Roccella gracilis. This is an example of how island birds broaden their feeding niche in resource-poor environments.

Rabbits have travelled with humans to the most remote archipelagos, having been introduced on at least 800 islands worldwide. This herbivore has caused a devastating effect on endemic insular plants, causing changes in species composition, cascading extinctions and disruption of native seed dispersal systems worldwide. However, its ecological impac...

Background and aims: The Canary Islands have strong floristic affinities with the Mediterranean Basin. One of the most characteristic and diverse vegetation belt of the archipelago is the thermophilous woodland (between 200 and 900 m.a.s.l.). This thermophilous plant community consists of many non-endemic species shared with the Mediterranean Flor...

Volcanic activity provides a unique opportunity to study the ecological responses of organisms to catastrophic environmental destruction as an essential driver of biodiversity change on islands. However, despite this great scientific interest, no study of the biodiversity at an erupting volcano has yet been undertaken. On La Palma (Canary archipela...

Reticulitermes flavipes, one of the most harmful subterranean termite pests, was recently reported for the first time from Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain). It is estimated that it was introduced between 2002 and 2005 in the northeast of the island. It affects buildings, crops and both native and ornamental plant species there, with consequent econ...

In autumn 2021, the largest volcanic eruption on the island of La Palma in historic records took place. The Canary Islands are of volcanic origin and eruptions have always constituted part of their natural disturbance regime. Until recently, their impacts could not be directly observed and studied. Influence of the emission of phytotoxic gases on b...

Interaction frequency is the most common currency in quantitative ecological networks, although interaction quality can also affect benefits provided by mutualisms. Here, we evaluate if interaction quality can modify network topology, species' role and whether such changes affect community vulnerability to species loss. We use a well-examined study...

El Parque Nacional del Teide alberga los principales núcleos poblacionales de cedro canario (Juniperus cedrus) en la isla de Tenerife. Los estudios científicos que aquí se recopilan han supuesto un importante avance en el conocimiento de esta especie y sientan la base para futuras investigaciones y actuaciones de gestión orientadas a la conservació...

Insects show remarkable phenotypic plasticity in response to changing environmental conditions. The abiotic factors that determine their phenotypes often vary in time and space, and oceanic islands harbour ideal environments for testing predictions on this matter. The ubiquitous beetle Pimelia laevigata costipennis Wollaston, 1864 (Tenebrionidae) i...

Insects show remarkable phenotypic plasticity in response to changing environmental conditions. The abiotic factors that determine their phenotypes often vary in time and space, and oceanic islands harbour ideal environments for testing predictions on this matter. The ubiquitous beetle Pimelia laevigata costipennis Wollaston, 1864 (Tenebrionidae) i...

Scientific and grey literature on invasive alien species (IAS) is conditioned by social, economic and political priorities, editorial preferences and species and ecosystem characteristics. This leads to knowledge gaps and mismatches between scientific research interests and management needs. We reviewed the literature on IAS management in Spain fou...

Research in Macaronesia has led to substantial advances in ecology, evolution and conservation biology. We review the scientific developments achieved in this region, and outline promising research avenues enhancing conservation. Some of these discoveries indicate that the Macaronesian flora and fauna are composed of rather young lineages, not Tert...

Pigeons are considered to play key ecological roles in frugivory and seed dispersal. They have colonised numerous oceanic islands and diversified into several species in sympatry. How these species coexist in similar niches is poorly understood although dietary separation is among the mechanisms suggested to avoid trophic overlap. We investigated t...

The interaction between climate change and biological invasions is a global conservation challenge with major consequences for invasive species management. However, our understanding of this interaction has substantial knowledge gaps; this is particularly relevant for invasive snakes on islands because they can be a serious threat to island ecosyst...

Summary of species inhabiting laurel forest that are consumed by the black rat (Rattus rattus) in the Canary Islands as registered by direct observation, personal communication, bibliography review, and detected in our macrohistological and DNA-based analyses (taxonomic identification of species using DNA sequences).

Summary of number of observations per level of each variable, including dropping locations and habitat, DNA barcoded plant species and dietary toxicity following Delgado (1998). We removed dropping nº4 from the statistical analyses because it was taken the same day and at the same location that dropping nº60.

Frequency of invertebrates found in the 79 droppings (out of 100) genetically identified using the GenBank BLAST.

Aim Seed dispersal by oceanic currents (thalassochory) is considered one of the main long‐distance dispersal (LDD) mechanisms for the colonization of oceanic islands by plants. Diaspores of littoral species are often hypothesized to be physiologically adapted to seawater dispersal, favouring interisland colonization. In this study, we experimentall...

The black rat (Rattus rattus) is an alien species that causes severe impact on island ecosystems, floras and faunas. The main aim of this study was to determine the plant and animal contributions to black rat diet in a pristine misty laurel forest area on La Palma (Canary Islands). Our working hypothesis was that this rat equally consumes plants an...

Many vertebrate species act as both plant pollinators and seed-dispersers, thus interconnecting these processes, particularly on islands. Ecological multilayer networks are a powerful tool to explore interdependencies between processes; however, quantifying the links between species engaging in different types of interactions (i.e. inter-layer edge...

Studies on feral cat diet offer important ecological information and are the first step towards determining their impact upon endangered species. However, in comparing seasonal changes in diet with seasonal prey availability, the scarce amount of research into oceanic islands worldwide must be considered when deciding if a specific population is ac...

Aim Coastal plants are terrestrial organisms for which ocean surface currents often act as long‐distance dispersal vectors (thalassochorous species) favouring broad distributions and connecting distant populations. However, few studies have statistically assessed the role of currents in modulating gene flow and species distributions of terrestrial...

Invasion events provide unique opportunities to explore how invasive species adapt to new environments. Size is one of the most important and obvious traits of an organism 1 , so understanding its changes could provide interesting insights to unravel invasive species evolution and mechanisms of adaptation in their invasive range. The invasive Calif...

Here, we first quantify the prey composition of an insular sparrowhawk population, during two stages: incubation-nestling, and post-fledging and dispersion of fledglings. On Madeira, we collected prey remains monthly during two consecutive breeding periods in 51 sparrowhawk nesting territories. Overall, we found 470 individuals of 13 species, of wh...

Nocturnal pollination plays an important role in sexual plant reproduction but has been overlooked, partially because of intrinsic difficulties in field experimentation. Even less attention has received the effect of within-inflorescence spatial position (distal or proximal) on nocturnal pollinators of columnar plants, despite numerous studies exam...

The behavioural complementarity of fruit‐eating animals is thought to exert a key role in plant community assembly. However, a mechanistic understanding of the causal links between the two processes is still lacking. This study assesses whether complementarity between dispersers in feeding and microhabitat‐use behaviour enhances community‐scale dis...

The project's target species, the Gran canaria Blue Chaffinch (Fringílla polatzekl), colloquially known as "pinzul" and "pinero", is considered in the Annex I of the Birds Directive as a "priority species". At the beginning of the project, its population was estimated to be about 300 individuals distributed between the Inagua pine forest (source po...

Islands harbor a considerable portion of global biodiversity and endemic biota, and also are the recipients of the largest proportional numbers of alien invaders. Such invaders may jeopardize the performance of native species, through either their direct or indirect effects. In this study, we investigated the reproductive ecology of the endemic scr...

Climatic conditions changing over time and space shape the evolution of organisms at multiple levels, including temperate lizards in the family Lacertidae. Here we reconstruct a dated phylogenetic tree of 262 lacertid species based on a supermatrix relying on novel phylogenomic datasets and fossil calibrations. Diversification of lacertids was acco...

The simplicity of insular communities implies less functional redundancy compared to analogous assemblages on the mainland. This has important implications for island conservation since the disappearance of one species could lead to the loss of its function in the ecosystem. Fruit-eating animals are key elements in many ecosystems, performing essen...

Aim To assess whether the reduced nutritional resources available for pollinators due to plant community simplification along an elevational plant‐diversity gradient changes pollinator niche breadth and richness. Additionally, we evaluated how body size and proboscis length of pollinators shifted along the gradient, and whether these changes were r...

Cats (Felis silvestris catus) are one of the most pernicious invasive species on islands, being responsible for the decline and extinction of many vertebrate taxa. Eradications programs are a powerful tool to fight against cat impacts on islands, but their implementation requires planning and design to prevent failure. In that sense, gathering data...

Fern sporangia may provide an important source of energy for bird species, which in turn can act as potential dispersers of viable spores. This study reports the first case of fern spore dispersal by land birds. We document the consumption of fern sporangia and evaluate the potential spore dispersal by Galápagos Finches on Santa Cruz Island. Overal...

Despite being abundant in urban gardens, the Canary Islands dragon tree Dracaena draco is close to extinction in the wild. It tends to produce relatively large fruits, which limits the pool of vertebrates that might disperse its seeds. We aimed to shed light on the seed dispersal system of this plant by studying its fruit size in relation to the fe...

published in "Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution"

Lizards have been reported as important pollinators on several oceanic islands. Here we evaluate the potential role of Galápagos lava lizards (Microlophus spp.) as pollinators across their radiation. During three years, we sampled pollen transport by nine lava lizard species on the 10 islands where they are present, including seven single‐island en...

PREMISE OF THE STUDY: The characteristic scarcity of insects on remote oceanic islands has driven non-flower specialized vertebrates to broaden their trophic niches and explore floral resources. From our previous studies in the Galápagos, we know that native insectivorous and frugivorous birds visit a wide range of entomophilous flowers and can als...

Islands tend to have lower species richness, more endemic species, and more pronounced extinction rates than mainland ecosystems. It makes island biota particularly vulnerable to habitat degradation, hunting and invasive species. As a consequence, many species have gone extinct on islands worldwide, especially on oceanic islands. The loss of these...

Background and Aims Oceanic island ecosystems favor the appearance of novel interactions as a consequence of their depauperate and disharmonic flora and fauna. Echium simplex, endemic to the Anaga Biosphere Reserve in NE Tenerife, Canary Islands, belongs to the Canarian bird–flower element. Methods Along two flowering seasons, we studied its breed...

Personality traits overlap in behavioral syndromes that are assumed to be related to physiology and life history traits, shaping pace-of-life syndromes. Boldness and explorative behavior are frequently associated with higher parasite loads, increased resource acquisition, less efficient antipredator behavior, and reduced survival (e.g., through pre...

Frugivory in lizards is often assumed to be constrained by body size; only large individuals are considered capable of consuming fruits, with the potential of acting as seed dispersers. However, only one previous study has tested the correlation of frugivory with body and head size at an archipelago scale across closely related species. All nine la...

Los ecosistemas de alta montaña, y en especial los de islas oceánicas, constituyen uno de los ambien-tes más aislados y únicos del planeta, albergando una biota muy particular especialmente vulnerable al cambio climático y a otras perturbaciones como la presencia de especies invasoras. Por ello hemos seleccionado la planta que vive a mayor altitud...

Alpine ecosystems on islands are among the most isolated on Earth, leading to very high rates of endemism. Endemic species on oceanic islands are particularly vulnerable to invasive herbivores. In the alpine zone of Tenerife, which harbors a unique endemic flora, the dominance pattern of the two most dominant species in our days (Spartocytisus supr...