Contrasting Effects of Intraspecific Trait Variation on Trait-Based Niches and Performance of Legumes in Plant Mixtures

Roscher, Christiane; Schumacher, Jens; Schmid, Bernhard; Schulze, Ernst Detlef

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0119786

Cited by 43 publications

(61 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…; Roscher et al. ). However, others have found that similar species do not exhibit similar trait expression, particularly in grassland ecosystems (Bennett et al.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Grass abundance shapes trait distributions of forbs in an experimental grassland

Mitchell

Bakker

2016

J Vegetation Science

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Questions During community assembly, plant functional traits are hypothesized to be filtered both by prevailing abiotic conditions and by competition from the surrounding community. While trait responses to abiotic conditions are well documented, whether and how traits respond to the biotic community is less studied. We investigated trait responses in specific leaf area (SLA) and plant height for eight forb species in response to increasing grass abundance. We asked: (1) do species’ trait distributions respond predictably to increased grass presence; (2) do functionally similar species respond similarly in terms of trait means to increased grass presence; and (3) at the community level, does increasing grass presence drive change in functional diversity among forbs? Location Glacial Heritage Preserve, Thurston County, Washington, USA. Methods Eight forb species were grown in communities that differed in the proportion of grass seed sown into the plot (grass‐rich, mixed and forb‐rich) in an experimental grassland established under uniform abiotic conditions. SLA and height were measured for 29–33 individuals per species per treatment, and differences among species and treatments were tested using PERMANOVA and PERMDISP. To assess how Festuca abundance impacted trait distributions for the entire suite of forbs, functional richness (FRic), functional evenness (FEve) and functional dispersion (FDis) were calculated for each seeding treatment and compared using ANOVA. Results Trait means and/or dispersion of most species responded to grass abundance, but the direction and magnitude differed among species. FEve was lowest in the grass‐rich treatment for SLA, and FRic was significantly lower in the grass‐rich treatment for both SLA and height. FDis for the combined traits was lowest in the grass‐rich treatment. Conclusions This study provides clear evidence that the biotic community can shape plant trait expression within and across species, and supports the idea that at the species level, trait values are not fixed, but rather can vary in response to biotic factors. This variation can impact functional diversity as well as community‐level trait estimates and therefore also affect our understanding of ecosystem functions that are reliant on those estimates.

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“…; Roscher et al. ). However, others have found that similar species do not exhibit similar trait expression, particularly in grassland ecosystems (Bennett et al.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…Other studies have demonstrated that, overall, species performance in legumes is better explained by trait convergence rather than divergence in response to richness and diversity (Roscher et al. ), although the opposite has been detected in grasses (Gubsch et al. ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Grass abundance shapes trait distributions of forbs in an experimental grassland

Mitchell

Bakker

2016

J Vegetation Science

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“…; Roscher et al . ; Cadotte ). Variation in these two traits has been shown to affect plant community productivity in contrasting ways: whereas low variation in height is related to asymmetric competition for light and increased productivity via selection effects, high variation in SLA is related to differential light‐use strategies and increased productivity via complementarity effects (Roscher et al .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Variation in these two traits has been shown to affect plant community productivity in contrasting ways: whereas low variation in height is related to asymmetric competition for light and increased productivity via selection effects, high variation in SLA is related to differential light‐use strategies and increased productivity via complementarity effects (Roscher et al . ; Cadotte ). As a consequence, we expected a narrowing/widening of the within‐species variation in height/SLA at low biodiversity due to community evolution.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Community evolution increases plant productivity at low diversity

et al. 2017

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Species extinctions from local communities negatively affect ecosystem functioning. Ecological mechanisms underlying these impacts are well studied, but the role of evolutionary processes is rarely assessed. Using a long-term field experiment, we tested whether natural selection in plant communities increased biodiversity effects on productivity. We re-assembled communities with 8-year co-selection history adjacent to communities with identical species composition but no history of co-selection ('na€ ıve communities'). Monocultures, and in particular mixtures of two to four co-selected species, were more productive than their corresponding na€ ıve communities over 4 years in soils with or without co-selected microbial communities. At the highest diversity level of eight plant species, no such differences were observed. Our findings suggest that plant community evolution can lead to rapid increases in ecosystem functioning at low diversity but may take longer at high diversity. This effect was not modified by treatments simulating co-evolutionary processes between plants and soil organisms.

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“…, Roscher et al. ) and thereby impact species coexistence and ecosystem functioning (Jung et al. , Turcotte and Levine ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Functional groups differ in trait means, but not in trait plasticity to species richness in local grassland communities

Roscher

Schumacher

Lipowsky

et al. 2018

Ecology

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Despite growing interest in incorporating intraspecific variation of functional traits in community-level studies, it remains unclear whether species classified into functional groups based on interspecific trait differences are similar regarding their variation in trait expression in response to varying plant diversity and composition in local communities. In a large biodiversity experiment (Jena Experiment) designed on a trait-based a priori definition of functional groups (grasses, legumes, small herbs, tall herbs), we studied means, extent of variation (coefficient of variation across communities) and plasticity to increased plant diversity (slopes over a logarithmic species richness ranging from 1, 2, 4, 8 and 16 to 60 species) for nine functional traits. Species means and extent of variation in traits related to nitrogen (N) acquisition and N use differed among functional groups and were more similar in phylogenetically closely related species than expected by chance. Species in the same functional group showed a weak phylogenetic signal and varied widely in means and extent of variation in traits related to shoot architecture and to a smaller extent in leaf traits related to carbon acquisition. This indicated that functional groups were less distinguishable in light than in nitrogen acquisition strategies. The direction and degree of trait plasticity to increasing species richness did not show a phylogenetic signal and were not different among functional groups, but varied largely among species within functional groups. Correlation structures in trait means, extent of trait variation and trait plasticity revealed functional tradeoffs in the acquisition of nitrogen and light across species. While correlations between trait means and extent of trait variation varied from trait to trait (positive, negative or unrelated), trait means and trait plasticity were mostly unrelated. Our results suggest that the concept of functional groups is viable, but context-specific trait measurements are required to improve our understanding about the functional significance of intraspecific trait variation and interspecific trait differences in local plant communities.

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Contrasting Effects of Intraspecific Trait Variation on Trait-Based Niches and Performance of Legumes in Plant Mixtures

Cited by 43 publications

References 52 publications

Grass abundance shapes trait distributions of forbs in an experimental grassland

Grass abundance shapes trait distributions of forbs in an experimental grassland

Community evolution increases plant productivity at low diversity

Functional groups differ in trait means, but not in trait plasticity to species richness in local grassland communities

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