Phylogenetic structure and diversity among herpetofaunal communities along a successional gradient of a tropical dry forest in Mexico

The tropical dry forest (TDF) is one of the most biodiverse ecosystems on earth, but also one of the mostthreatened. Therefore, it is critical to understand the processes that control community assembly and generate diversity during succession. We surveyed 15 herpetofaunal communities from a chronosequenceof succession plots and tested whether phylogenetic structure (nonrandom distribution of species withrespect to phylogeny) and phylogenetic diversity (incorporation of phylogenetic differences betweenspecies to measure biodiversity) differed among seasons and succession stages of the TDF in westernMexico. Phylogenetic structure and diversity of both groups showed temporal shifts. Our data suggesta role of environmental filtering in the first succession stages: during the rainy season in amphibians, allowing the coexistence of closely related species in water ponds, while for reptiles during the dry season, where higher exposure to solar radiation and humidity loss predominate in pastures. The more distantlyrelated species in primary and secondary forests in later succession stages may predict ecosystem stabilityassuring the sufficient ecological strategies in a community to achieve the persistence of the ecosystemunder changing conditions. Our results strengthen the arguments for promoting the conservation andmanaging of secondary forests under recovery to maintain phylogenetic diversity. (c) 2022 Associac, similar to ao Brasileira de Ci <^>encia Ecol ' ogica e Conservac,similar to ao. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is anopen access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).