Fig 1.
Litterbags placed in the Harvard Forest warming chambers.
Different mesh sizes were used to control the size of the invertebrate community accessing the bags (‘invertebrate exclusion treatments’).
Fig 2.
Air temperature and invertebrate diversity and decomposition rates.
Average air temperature reduced A) invertebrate abundance, B) invertebrate richness, and C) and percent leaf litter lost in the litterbags.
Fig 3.
Nonmetric multidimensional scaling (NMDS) plot visualizing the invertebrate community in the litterbags, with invertebrate exclusion treatment separated by color.
The communities are aggregated by treatment within chamber (n = 30). The direction and length of the arrows indicate the relationship between the environmental factors (average air temperature and average soil moisture) and the community matrix. The NMDS stress is 0.20.
Fig 4.
Boxplot showing the relationship between invertebrate exclusion and percent leaf litter lost.
Maximal invertebrate exclusion had lower leaf litter loss than minimal and moderate invertebrate exclusion, which in turn did not differ. NS P > 0.05 ** P < 0.01.
Fig 5.
Structural equation model evaluating direct and indirect relationships between average air temperature in the warming chambers and invertebrate abundance, invertebrate richness, and leaf litter loss.
The values reported are the standardized path coefficients. Solid lines indicate significant paths (P < 0.05), while dashed lines indicate non-significant paths (P > 0.05). Red lines indicate negative relationships while black lines indicate positive relationships. The R2 for abundance = 0.11 and decomposition = 0.13. * P < 0.05.