For the UHURU Pollination Networks Calculated Using R Package Bipartite with Statistics from R Package Lme4
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LARGE MAMMALS, RAINFALL VARIATION, AND THE STRUCTURE OF PLANT- POLLINATOR NETWORKS IN AN AFRICAN SAVANNA By TRAVIS JAMES GUY A THESIS PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF SCIENCE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2017 © 2017 Travis Guy To my loving and hilarious family. To my mom for her unending love, patience, positivity, and encouragement. You have shaped me into the person I am today and who, without, I would have accomplished a mere fraction of what I have done. I owe so much to you. To my dad for showing me the world's beauty and igniting my adventurous spirit. To my brother for being my best friend, epic adventure partner, and showing me a world of possibilities. And to anyone who has gone out of their way to make this wonderful world a better place. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost I thank my friend, mentor, and advisor Dr. Todd Palmer. He stood by me through the good and the bad times, never wavering in his support and encouragement and having immeasurable patience with me. I owe a great deal of my success to Todd. He instilled a passion for field ecology in me 12 years ago at a small field camp in Kenya and has continued to shape me into the ecologist I have become today. Without his brilliance this project would have never been conceived and the finished product would have paled in comparison to what it is now. Todd’s knowledge of African savanna ecology, scientific processes, psychology, bourbon, and especially life is unsurpassed, and I am grateful he imparted even a fraction of this wisdom on me. In short, I would not have written this thesis nor have had such an amazing and successful graduate career without him. I am also indebted to Dr. Katherine Baldock for introducing me to the world of pollination webs, bipartite, and network analysis. She was instrumental in the design and methodology of my project and without her guidance, I would still be lost trying to mathematically describe pollination networks. Her patience and persistence in answering question after question being passed across the Atlantic, often through broken skype chat, is beyond admirable. I cannot thank her enough for her help in initial pollinator identification and for sharing with and introducing me to her network of insect taxonomists. She was a most gracious host during my time at the University of Bristol where my network analysis took shape, and she makes a mean cup of British tea. Simply put, this research would not have occurred without her. I would also like to thank Dr. Juan Carlos Ruiz Guajardo for jump-starting my project while in Kenya. I am thankful for the knowledge of local flora he imparted on me 4 and for tidying up my on-the-ground field methods. Similarly, I thank Dr. Gavin Ballantyne for assistance in flower and pollinator identification and helpful discussion on pollination network structure and metrics. I am beyond grateful to my Kenyan field assistants Zachary Ntanyaki, Julius Olengingiro, and Peter Ekai. They worked tirelessly day after long day in the hot sun, always with a smile on their faces, and they saved me a time or two when elephants snuck up on me. Julius’ humor was calming and kept me grounded during the stressful times. I learned a great deal about the natural history of the area from Zachary, and boy could he wield a butterfly net! Peter was the pinning whiz, and he could work magic with forceps, a pin, and a micro pollinator. Without their help, I would still be watching plants and pinning insect. I would like to give a special thanks to all the staff at Mpala Research Centre. Who knew a field station in the middle of the bush could be so posh? Identifying 2,242 African insects was a daunting task. I am forever grateful to Laban Njoroge of the National Museum of Kenya for his assistance in helping me identify all of my specimens to family, for identifying all my coleopteran specimens to species, and for helping me wade through the permits and paperwork to export my insect specimens to the United States. I am also grateful to Dr. Gary Steck and Charles Whitehill of the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services for their invaluable advice on safely shipping fragile insect specimens around the world. I would like to extend a huge thanks to all of the insect taxonomists around the globe who worked diligently to identify poorly known African insects to species level. Being able to construct networks using such high-resolution data has helped to make this project world-class. I thank Mary Gikungu (Apoidea), Jane Macharia (Apoidea), the late Joseph 5 Mugambi (Lepidoptera), Alain Pauly (Halictidae), Connal Eardley (Apidae and Megachilidae), James Carpenter (Vespidae), Kevin Williams (Vespidae), Wojciech Pulawski (Sphecidae), Raymond Wahis (Pompilidae), Paolo Rosa (Chrysididae), Gerard en Toos Schulten (Scolidae), Donald Quicke (Braconidae), Simon Van Noort (Gasteruptiidae), Adrian Pont (Muscidae), John Deeming (Muscidae and Calliphoridae), Pierfilippo Cerretti (Tachinidae), Daniel Whitmore (Sarcophagidae), Andrew Whittington (Syrphidae), Neal Evenhuis (Bombyliidae), Jason Londt (Asilidae), Torsten Dikow (Asilidae), Gary Steck (Tephritidae), Andy Warren (Lepidoptera), James Hayden (Lepidoptera), Susan Halbert (Hemiptera), and Dino Martins (Formicidae) for their hard work identifying my insects. I would like to thank the other members of the Palmer lab—Patrick Milligan, Dr. Kirsten Prior, and Jessica Gunson—for their helpful discussions and logistic help both in Kenya and Florida. I am also greatly appreciative of Dr. Jacob Goheen, Dr. Rob Pringle, and Todd for letting me use their UHURU experiment to collect my data. I greatly appreciate the feedback and helpful suggestion provided to be by my committee members Dr. Colette St. Mary and Dr. Benjamin Baiser. I was funded by a Sigma Xi Grant-in-Aid of Research, A Tropical Conservation and Development Field Research Grant, and the Brian Riewald Memorial Fund Research Grant and supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (Grant No. DGE- 1315138). I thank the Kenyan government for allowing me to conduct research in their beautiful country (Permit No. NACOSTI/P/14/8685/1657). I would like to extend a special thank you to 8th grade science teacher Dave Adams for opening my mind to the awe-inspiring nature of science and Dr. Chris Walser 6 for introducing me to the joys (and struggles) of field ecology. Lucille Ramsey funded my undergraduate trip to Kenya where this journey all began. I will never forget that opportunity she provided for me. None of this work would have been possible without the support and love of my parents, Judy and Reg. They are the reason I am the person I am today. No matter the circumstance, they were always there for me. My mother has an uncanny ability to lift me out of the lows and put a smile back on my face. She kept me going every time I wanted to quit. I am forever indebted to her for all of her sacrifices and for everything she has given me. Do not underestimate how important in graduate school (or in life) it is to have a brother who is quick to say “Don’t worry, you will figure out R coding. Let’s go skiing!” Words cannot begin to express the gratitude I have for my girlfriend Elisha Kayser. She has been there for me during this entire wild ride. My project and life are certainly better because of her. She was a tremendous field assistant in Kenya, often finding solutions to field problems when I could not. She kept the project on target with her amazing logistical support, not to mention she’s an excellent insect pinner and packer. She put up with me being thousands of miles away and at times moved from her beloved mountains to Florida, in essence putting her life on hold so that I could pursue my dreams. I would not have made it through without her emotional support. She was always willing to drop everything she was doing at any moment to help me out. Graduate school was a great challenge, but it was certainly made easier because of Elisha. 7 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................. 4 LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................ 9 LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................ 10 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................... 11 ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................... 13 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 15 2 METHODS .............................................................................................................. 21 Study Site ............................................................................................................... 21 Study Design .......................................................................................................... 21 Sampling Methods .................................................................................................. 22 Network Metrics ...................................................................................................... 24 Data Analysis .........................................................................................................