Aim To determine how species richness gradients—commonly considered universal—vary across the phylogenetic hierarchy of birds and mammals, and to uncover how clade age and size predetermine the gradients. Location Global. Time Period Last 120 million years. Taxa Studied Birds and mammals (~15,000 species). Methods We used large‐scale phylogenies of birds and mammals and captured the species richness gradient for each of their...

Aim To evaluate the extent to which dorsal body colouration in lagomorphs follows ecogeographical patterns, particularly Gloger's rule, by assessing the relative influence of climate, forest vertical structure, and phylogenetic relatedness on eumelanin‐ and pheomelanin‐based pigmentation. Location Global. Time Period Contemporary. Major Taxa Studied Lagomorpha (families Leporidae and Ochotonidae). Methods We extracted dorsal c...

Aim Animal coloration varies in response to environmental conditions. One well‐known principle, Gloger's rule, suggests that warmer and wetter environments lead to more pigmented animals. Yet, the original formulation lacks differentiation between the two primary melanin pigments: eumelanin and pheomelanin. We examined spatial eumelanin and pheomelanin variation to unravel the impact of various ecological factors on pigment de...

Aim Inverse latitudinal diversity gradients (i‐LDGs), whereby regional richness peaks outside the tropics, have rarely been investigated, and their causes remain unclear. Here, we investigate three prominent explanations, postulating that species‐rich regions have had: (1) longer time to accumulate species; (2) faster diversification; and (3) more energy to support species‐rich communities. These mechanisms have been shown to...

Aim To investigate the contributions of ecosystem productivity, temperature‐dependent metabolism and climatic tolerances to the latitudinal gradient in species richness and changes in species composition in tropical and subtropical regions. Location Global. Time period Contemporary. Major taxa studied Termites. Methods We compiled termite occurrence data from papers using the standardized sampling protocol proposed 20 years ag...

Measures of traits are the basis of functional biological diversity. Numerous works consider mean species‐level measures of traits while ignoring individual variance within species. However, there is a large amount of variation within species and it is increasingly apparent that it is important to consider trait variation not only between species, but also within species. Mammals are an interesting group for investigating trai...