Can trait patterns along gradients predict plant community responses to climate change?

Guittar, John; Goldberg, Deborah E.; Klanderud, Kari; Telford, Richard J.; Vandvik, Vigdis

doi:10.1002/ecy.1500

Cited by 86 publications

(97 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…In addition, Guittar et al . () indicate that plants from warmer sites tend to be larger in a community‐wide study and Meineri et al . () show an increased size at flowering for Veronica officinalis , both working in the same model system as us.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 81%

“…Traits related to foraging are also found to drive community responses to climate change in a community‐wide field study in the same study system (Guittar et al . ). Plasticity of the foraging‐related traits is low and constant across origins.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…These traits therefore seem to be the primary drivers of a species' ability to respond to climate (see also Guittar et al . ). However, Herben et al .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…High between‐trait variation in response to local climate has already been shown in the same system at the community level (Guittar et al . ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Genetic differentiation and plasticity interact along temperature and precipitation gradients to determine plant performance under climate change

et al. 2017

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 81%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…These traits therefore seem to be the primary drivers of a species' ability to respond to climate (see also Guittar et al . ). However, Herben et al .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…High between‐trait variation in response to local climate has already been shown in the same system at the community level (Guittar et al . ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Genetic differentiation and plasticity interact along temperature and precipitation gradients to determine plant performance under climate change

et al. 2017

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“…Guittar et al. () show no significant response for either trait. The inconsistent relationships seen across these studies conducted in the same vegetation type with similar methodologies suggest that these traits are not the appropriate “response trait” candidates for assessing community responses to water availability.…”

Section: Community‐weighted Response Traitsmentioning

confidence: 92%

Trait selection and community weighting are key to understanding ecosystem responses to changing precipitation regimes

et al. 2018

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Plant traits can be used to predict ecosystem responses to environmental change using a response–effect trait framework. To do this, appropriate traits must be identified that explain a species' influence on ecosystem function (“effect traits”) and the response of those species to environmental change (“response traits”). Response traits are often identified and measured along gradients in plant resources, such as water availability; however, precipitation explains very little variation in most plant traits globally. Given the strong relationship between plant traits and ecosystem functions, such as net primary productivity (NPP), and between NPP and precipitation, the lack of correlation between precipitation and plant traits is surprising. We address this issue through a systematic review of >500 published studies that describe plant trait responses to altered water availability. The overarching goal of this review was to identify potential causes for the weak relationship between commonly measured plant traits and water availability so that we may identify more appropriate “response traits.” We attribute weak trait–precipitation relationships to an improper selection of traits (e.g., nonhydraulic traits) and a lack of trait‐based approaches that adjust for trait variation within communities (only 4% of studies measure community‐weighted traits). We then highlight the mechanistic value of hydraulic traits as more appropriate “response traits” with regard to precipitation, which should be included in future community‐scale trait surveys. Trait‐based ecology has the potential to improve predictions of ecosystem responses to predicted changes in precipitation; however, this predictive power depends heavily on the identification of reliable response and effect traits. To this end, trait surveys could be improved by a selection of traits that reflect physiological functions directly related to water availability with traits weighted by species relative abundance. A http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1365-2435.13135/suppinfo is available for this article.

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Substituting space for time: Bird responses to forest loss in space provide a general picture of responses over time

Attinello,

Fahrig,

Smith

et al. 2023

Ecological Applications

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The practice of space‐for‐time substitution assumes that the responses of species or communities to land use change over space represents how they will respond to that same change over time. Space‐for‐time substitution is commonly used in both ecology and conservation, but whether the assumption produces reliable insights remains inconclusive. Here, we tested space‐for‐time substitution using data from the North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) and Global Forest Change (GFC) to compare the effects of landscape‐scale forest cover on bird richness and abundance over time and space, for 25 space‐time comparisons. Each comparison consisted of a landscape that experienced at least 20% forest loss over 19 years (temporal site), and a set of 15‐19 landscapes (spatial sites) that represented the same forest cover gradient over space in 2019 as experienced over time in their corresponding temporal site. Across the 25 comparisons, the observed responses of forest and open‐habitat birds to forest cover over time generally aligned with their responses to forest cover over space, but with comparatively higher variability in the magnitude and direction of effect across the 25 temporal slopes than across the 25 spatial slopes. On average, the mean differences between the spatial and temporal slopes across the 25 space‐time comparisons frequently overlapped with zero, suggesting that the spatial slopes are generally informative of the temporal slopes. However, we observed high variability around these mean differences indicating that a single spatial slope is not strongly predictive of its corresponding temporal slope. We suggest that our results may be explained by annual variability in other relevant environmental factors that combine to produce complex effects on population abundances over time that are not easily captured by snapshots in space. While not being a 1:1 proxy, measuring bird responses to changes in habitat amount in space provides an idea on how birds might be expected to eventually equilibrate to similar changes in habitat amount over time. Further, analyses such as this could be potentially used to screen for cases of regional space‐time mismatches where population‐limiting factors other than habitat could be playing a more important role in the population trends observed there.This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

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Can trait patterns along gradients predict plant community responses to climate change?

Cited by 86 publications

References 55 publications

Genetic differentiation and plasticity interact along temperature and precipitation gradients to determine plant performance under climate change

Genetic differentiation and plasticity interact along temperature and precipitation gradients to determine plant performance under climate change

Trait selection and community weighting are key to understanding ecosystem responses to changing precipitation regimes

Substituting space for time: Bird responses to forest loss in space provide a general picture of responses over time

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