A tenet of ecology is that temporal variability in ecological structure and processes tends to decrease with increasing spatial scales (from locales to regions) and levels of biological organization (from populations to communities). However, patterns in temporal variability across trophic levels and the mechanisms that produce them remain poorly understood. Here we analyzed the abundance time series of spatially structured communities (i.e., metacommunities) spanning basal resources to top predators from 355 freshwater sites across three continents. Specifically, we used a hierarchical partitioning method to disentangle the propagation of temporal variability in abundance across spatial scales and trophic levels. We then used structural equation modeling to determine if the strength and direction of relationships between temporal variability, synchrony, biodiversity, and environmental and spatial settings depended on trophic level and spatial scale. We found that temporal variability in abundance decreased from producers to tertiary consumers but did so mainly at the local scale. Species population synchrony within sites increased with trophic level, whereas synchrony among communities decreased. At the local scale, temporal variability in precipitation and species diversity were associated with population variability (linear partial coefficient, β = 0.23) and population synchrony (β = -0.39) similarly across trophic levels, respectively. At the regional scale, community synchrony was not related to climatic or spatial predictors, but the strength of relationships between metacommunity variability and community synchrony decreased systematically from top predators (β = 0.73) to secondary consumers (β = 0.54), to primary consumers (β = 0.30) to producers (β = 0). Our results suggest that mobile predators may often stabilize metacommunities by buffering variability that originates at the base of food webs. This finding illustrates that the trophic structure of metacommunities, which integrates variation in organismal body size and its correlates, should be considered when investigating ecological stability in natural systems. More broadly, our work advances the notion that temporal stability is an emergent property of ecosystems that may be threatened in complex ways by biodiversity loss and habitat fragmentation.

Aquatic Ecology Laboratory Department of Evolution Ecology and Organismal Biology The Ohio State University Columbus Ohio USA

CCB Nupelia PEA PGB Maringá State University Maringá Brazil

Department of Biological Sciences Southern Illinois University Edwardsville Illinois USA

Department of Botany and Zoology Faculty of Science Masaryk University Brno Czech Republic

Department of Ecology and Genetics University of Oulu Oulu Finland

Department of Environmental Science Policy and Management University of California Berkeley Berkeley California USA

Department of Environmental Sciences Federal University of São Carlos São Carlos Brazil

Department of Hydrobiology Federal University of São Carlos São Carlos Brazil

Department of Life and Environmental Sciences Faculty of Science and Technology Bournemouth University Poole UK

Department of River Ecology and Conservation Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum Frankfurt Germany

Department of Watershed Sciences National Aquatic Monitoring Center and Ecology Center Utah State University Logan Utah USA

Department of Wildlife Fish and Conservation Biology University of California Davis California USA

Ecology and Genetics Research Unit University of Oulu Oulu Finland

Faculty of Biology University of Duisburg Essen Essen Germany

FEHM Lab Barcelona Spain

FEHM Lab Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research Barcelona Spain

Hancock Biological Station Biological Sciences Murray State University Murray Kentucky USA

INRAE UR RiverLy Centre Lyon Grenoble Auvergne Rhône Alpes Villeurbanne Cedex France

Institute of Biosciences São Paulo State University Rio Claro Brazil

International Institute for Sustainable Development Experimental Lakes Area Kenora Ontario Canada

Northumbria University Newcastle upon Tyne UK

Norwegian Institute for Water Research Oslo Norway

Oulanka Research Station University of Oulu Oulu Finland

School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences University of Washington Seattle Washington USA

School of Biological Sciences Illinois State University Normal Illinois USA

School of Biological Sciences University of Canterbury Christchurch New Zealand

T G Masaryk Water Research Institute p r i Brno Branch Office Brno Czech Republic

Te Pūnaha Matatini Centre of Research Excellence in Complex Systems Bioprotection Aotearoa Centre of Research Excellence Auckland New Zealand

Translational Data Analytics Institute The Ohio State University Columbus Ohio USA

University of Wisconsin Madison Center for Limnology Trout Lake Station Boulder Junction Wisconsin USA

Virginia Institute of Marine Science Gloucester Point Virginia USA

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