Plant traits-the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants-determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait-based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits-almost complete coverage for 'plant growth form'. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait-environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects.We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives. Geosphere-Biosphere Program (IGBP) and DIVERSITAS, the TRY database (TRY-not an acronym, rather a statement of sentiment; https ://www.try-db.org; Kattge et al., 2011) was proposed with the explicit assignment to improve the availability and accessibility of plant trait data for ecology and earth system sciences. The Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry (MPI-BGC) offered to host the database and the different groups joined forces for this community-driven program. Two factors were key to the success of TRY: the support and trust of leaders in the field of functional plant ecology submitting large databases and the long-term funding by the Max Planck Society, the MPI-BGC and the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, which has enabled the continuous development of the TRY database.

Predicting which nonnative species become invasive is critical for their successful management, and Charles Darwin provided predictions based on species' relatedness. However, Darwin provided two opposing predictions about the relatedness of introduced nonnatives to indigenous species. First, environmental fit is the dominant factor determining invader success; thus, we should expect that invasive species are closely related to local native residents. Alternatively, if competition is important, we should expect successful invaders are distantly related to the native residents. These opposing expectations are referred to as Darwin's naturalization conundrum. The results of studies that examine nonnative species relatedness to natives are largely inconsistent. This inconsistency arises from the fact that studies occur at different spatial and temporal scales, and at different stages of invasion, and so implicitly examine different mechanisms. Further, while species have evolved ecological differences, the mode and tempo of evolution can affect species' differences, complicating the predictions from simple hypotheses. We outline unanswered questions and provide guidelines for collecting the data required to test competing hypotheses.

Increased globalization has accelerated the movement of species around the world. Many of these nonnative species have the potential to profoundly alter ecosystems. The mechanisms underpinning this impact are often poorly understood, and traits are often overlooked when trying to understand and predict the impacts of species invasions on communities. We conducted an observational field experiment in Canada's first National Urban Park, where we collected trait data for seven different functional traits (height, stem width, specific leaf area, leaf percent nitrogen, and leaf percent carbon) across an abundance gradient of the invasive Vincetoxicum rossicum in open meadow and understory habitats. We assessed invasion impacts on communities, and associated mechanisms, by examining three complementary functional trait measures: community‐weighted mean, range of trait values, and species’ distances to the invader in trait space. We found that V. rossicum invasion significantly altered the functional structure of herbaceous plant communities. In both habitats V. rossicum changed the community‐weighted means, causing invaded communities to become increasingly similar in their functional structure. In addition, V. rossicum also reduced the trait ranges for a majority of traits indicating that species are being deterministically excluded in invaded communities. Further, we observed different trends in the meadow and understory habitats: In the understory, resident species that were more similar to V. rossicum in multivariate trait space were excluded more, however this was not the case in the meadow habitat. This suggests that V. rossicum alters communities uniquely in each habitat, in part by creating a filter in which only certain resident species are able to persist. This filtering process causes a nonrandom reduction in species' abundances, which in turn would be expected to alter how the invaded ecosystems function. Using trait‐based frameworks leads to better understanding and prediction of invasion impacts. This novel framework can also be used in restoration practices to understand how invasion impacts communities and to reassemble communities after invasive species management.