Fig 1.
Map of the study area showing (a) the location of Waihī Estuary in New Zealand, and (b) the area of Waihī Estuary where (c) the experimental plots were located.
(d) Close-up view of OTC showing position of stake with temperature loggers attached. Imagery retrieved from Land Information New Zealand (https://data.linz.govt.nz/).
Table 1.
List of the functional traits and traits-modalities selected based on their response to extreme weather events [modified from 65]. Acronyms are used in Fig 4.
Fig 2.
Boxplots showing the sediment temperature (°C) recorded during the in-situ simulated heatwave experiment.
Column a) shows the mean, minimum, and maximum temperature recorded during each OTC period each day (seven consecutive days) for each treatment (Control, Short, Long, n = 10). Column b) shows the mean, minimum, and maximum temperature recorded during all OTC periods for the week (7 days) for each treatment (Control, Short, Long, n = 70). Note the lower temperatures and smaller control-treatment differences on days 6 and 7 due to the arrival of cooler, cloudier weather. Thick lines = median, dots = outliers.
Fig 3.
Boxplots showing the macrobenthic (a) richness (number of taxa), (b) abundance (total number of individuals per core-1), and (c) diversity (H’) across treatments (Control, Short, Long) in Waihī Estuary.
Thick lines = median, dots = outliers. Significant differences p < 0.05 between treatments are shown as “a, b”.
Table 2.
Test results from univariate one-way fixed factor PERMANOVA to compare functional trait modalities between treatments. Significant differences are shown in bold. NC: No computed.
Fig 4.
Community-weighted means (CWM) of functional trait-modalities expression.
Scale represents the proportional contribution (each concentric line represents 0.25) to CWM recorded in (a) Control, (b) Short, and (c) Long treatments in Waihī Estuary. Trait modalities labels (acronyms) are defined in Table 1.
Fig 5.
Bootstrapped non-Metric Multidimensional Scaling (MDS) ordination plot showing the macrobenthic (a) community structure and (b) trait composition across treatments in Waihī Estuary.
Symbols close together in ordination space indicate greater similarity in multivariate composition.
Fig 6.
Boxplots showing the macrobenthic (a) Functional Richness, (b) Functional Evenness, (c) Fucntional Dispersion, and (d) Functional Redundancy across treatments (Control, Short, Long) in Waihī Estuary.
Thick lines = median, dots = outliers. Significant differences p < 0.05 between treatments are shown as “a, b, c”.
Fig 7.
Level plot showing the spearman correlations between the mean, maximum, and minimum sediment temperature and functional traits in each of the treatments (Control, Short, Long).
Functional traits – orange: Bioturbation, sky blue: Body size, green: Feeding mode, yellow: Living habit, blue: Movement method, vermilion: Sediment position. The colour scale indicates the magnitude of the correlations based on the Spearman correlation coefficient (rho (ρ) = + 1, 0, −1).
Fig 8.
Level plot showing the spearman correlations between the mean, maximum, and minimum temperatures recorded at each of the treatments (Control, Short, Long) and the taxonomical and functional metrics.
The colour scale indicates the magnitudes of the correlations based on the Spearman correlation coefficient (rho (ρ) = + 1, 0, −1). S: richness, N: abundance, H: diversity, FRic: Functional Richness, FEve: Functional Evenness, FDis: Functional Dispersion, FR: Functional Redundancy.