How do humans restructure the biodiversity of the Sonoran Desert?
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We studied patterns of biodiversity across the entire urban, suburban, agricultural, and surrounding Sonoran Desert landscape of central Arizona-Phoenix. A probability-based extensive integrated field inventory was used to survey perennial plants, pollen, birds, and sample soil chemistry, supplemented by monthly or quarterly monitoring of arthropod and bird communities at some sites. For taxa and ecosystem properties directly manipulated by people (e.g., perennial plant diversity, pollen) dominantly geomorphic controls in undeveloped desert were replaced by factors such as land use, agricultural legacy effects, income, and population density across the urban core. In contrast, native taxa indirectly affected by human activities (e.g., invertebrates and birds) showed modified diversity rather than widespread replacement, with reductions in ground arthropod, spider, and bee diversity, but increased bird diversity in some seasons.