The origin and maintenance of montane diversity: integrating evolutionary and ecological processes

Spatial variation in diversity results from the interplay of ecological and evolutionary mechanisms acting over contemporary and historical time frames (MacArthur 1972, Graham et al. 2006, Ricklefs 2006, Jetz et al. 2012). Numerous attempts have been made to evaluate the relative roles of ecological and evolutionary factors that operate at diverse spatial and temporal scales in shaping patterns of diversity (Terborgh and Faaborg 1980, Rahbek and Graves 2001, Hawkins et al. 2005, Stevens 2006, Rabosky 2009, Kozak and Wiens 2010). However, a general framework that guides the integration of diff erent mechanisms to understand the interplay of ecology and evolution on diversity patterns is only just emerging. Generally speaking, this emerging framework consists of conceptual and methodological advances targeted at understanding patterns of diversity that fall into three general categories. First, attempts targeted at understanding spatial variation in species richness evaluate both ecological environmental correlates (e.g. energy) and evolutionary mechanisms (e.g. time for speciation; Li et al. 2009, Kozak and Wiens 2012). Second, evolutionary approaches now explicitly acknowledge that ecological interactions, such as interspecifi c interactions and niche partitioning, might place upper limits on the number of species that can occur in a given area. Th ese local-scale phenomena are now considered in attempts to evaluate diversity patterns and © 2014 Th e Authors. Ecography © 2014 Nordic Society Oikos Subject Editor: Jens-Christian Svenning. Accepted 9 April 2014 Ecography 37: 711–719, 2014 doi: 10.1111/ecog.00578