Incorporating imperfect detection in estimating species richness has burgeoned in the past decade, with the recent extension to functional and phylogenetic diversity. However, no study has investigated how imperfect detection affects the estimates of functional and phylogenetic community structure. We here employed multi-species occupancy models to assess the effects of imperfect detection on estimates of bird diversity and community structure by incorporating species traits and phylogenies in a land-bridge island system.
Results/Conclusions
Our results showed that taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic diversity were all underestimated significantly as a result of species’ imperfect detection, with functional diversity having the highest detectability. The functional and phylogenetic structure calculated from observed communities were both more clustered than those from the true (or detection-corrected) communities due to the missing of distinct species. The discrepancy between observed and estimated diversity differed by measures of biodiversity facets and co-varied with island area and isolation. Our study demonstrates the importance of accounting for imperfect detection of species in biodiversity studies to better infer mechanisms that structure community assembly, and to make reliable management decisions for biodiversity conservation.