General stabilizing effects of plant diversity on grassland productivity through population asynchrony and overyielding

Héctor, Andy; Hautier, Yann; Saner, Philippe; Wacker, Luca; Bagchi, Robert; Joshi, Jasmin; Scherer‐Lorenzen, Michael; Spehn, Eva; Bazeley-White, E.; Weilenmann, Markus; Caldeira, María C.; Dimitrakopoulos, Panayiotis G.; Finn, John A.; Huss‐Danell, Kerstin; Jumpponen, Ari; Mulder, Christa P. H.; Palmborg, Cecilia; Pereira, J. S.; Siamantziouras, A.-S. D.; Terry, Andrew; Troumbis, Andreas Y.; Schmid, Bernhard; Loreau, Michel

doi:10.1890/09-1162.1

Cited by 472 publications

(548 citation statements)

References 29 publications

(43 reference statements)

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“…In these communities, we identified a larger number of negative covariances between species populations both within the same trophic level (for basal species) and across trophic levels. This mirrors recent experimental and theoretical work on the relationship between diversity and stability in competitive communities (Tilman et al, 2006;Hector et al, 2010;Loreau and de Mazancourt, 2013). In those studies diversity was found to stabilize aggregate community or ecosystem properties while simultaneously destabilizing individual species abundances.…”

Section: Discussion Complexity and Robustness To Invasionssupporting

confidence: 79%

Network complexity and species traits mediate the effects of biological invasions on dynamic food webs

et al. 2014

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Biological invasions are a major threat to natural communities worldwide. While several species traits have been identified as important determinants of invasion success, a systematic exploration of the effects of invasions on native communities, and the role of species and community features on community robustness in the face of invasion is lacking. We present a theoretical approximation considering food web structure and species population dynamics to study the effects of invasions on complex food webs. We find that less complex (i.e., less connected) food webs are more resistant to invasions. Simulated invasions promote profound changes in several food web properties and stability measures, such as decreases in modularity and the number of food chains from basal to top species; and a decoupling of community-and population-level temporal variability. Additionally, species traits such as body size and diet breadth are strong determinants of invasion success across several trophic levels, with larger and more generalist species being more successful invaders in general. Our work complements species-centered invasion studies by adding a more holistic and systematic perspective to the study of invasions on species interaction networks.

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Section: Discussion Complexity and Robustness To Invasionssupporting

confidence: 79%

Network complexity and species traits mediate the effects of biological invasions on dynamic food webs

et al. 2014

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“…But theory and data both support greater temporal stability of a community property like total biomass at higher levels of diversity. Five syntheses have 40 summarized how diversity impacts variation of ecosystem functions through time [38][39][40][41][42] , and these have shown that total resource capture and biomass production are generally more stable in more diverse communities. The mechanisms by which diversity confers stability include overyielding, statistical averaging, and compensatory dynamics.…”

Section: There Is Mounting Evidence That Biodiversity Increases the Smentioning

confidence: 99%

Biodiversity loss and its impact on humanity

Cardinale

Duffy

Gonzalez

et al. 2012

Nature

5,532

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This is an author produced version of a paper published in Nature. This paper has been peer-reviewed and is proof-corrected, but does not include the journal pagination. The most unique feature of Earth is the existence of life, and the most extraordinary feature of life is its diversity. Approximately 9 million types of plants, animals, protists and fungi inhabit the earth. So, too, do 7 billion people. Two decades ago, at the first Earth Summit, the vast majority of the world's nations declared that human actions were dismantling Earth's ecosystems, eliminating genes, species, and biological traits at an alarming rate. This observation led to a daunting question: How 30 will loss of biological diversity alter the functioning of ecosystems and their ability to provide society with the goods and services needed to prosper?

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“…This hypothesis has gained support from testing in several ecosystem types, especially in grasslands (Hector et al, 2010;Cardinale et al, 2011;Morin et al, 2014). In addition to species and genotype diversity (Hughes et al, 2008), the functional diversity, i.e., the presence of species and plant functional types with different physiology, morphology, resource requirements, seasonal growth patterns and life history may increase the productivity of an ecosystem (Tilman et al, 1997;Cadotte et al, 2008).…”

Section: The Role Of Functional Diversity For Peatland Carbon Sinkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Species-specific temporal variation in photosynthesis as a moderator of peatland carbon sequestration

et al. 2017

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Abstract. In boreal bogs plant species are low in number, but they differ greatly in their growth forms and photosynthetic properties. We assessed how ecosystem carbon (C) sink dynamics were affected by seasonal variations in the photosynthetic rate and leaf area of different species. Photosynthetic properties (light response parameters), leaf area development and areal cover (abundance) of the species were used to quantify species-specific net and gross photosynthesis rates (P N and P G , respectively), which were summed to express ecosystem-level P N and P G . The ecosystem-level P G was compared with a gross primary production (GPP) estimate derived from eddy covariance (EC) measurements.Species areal cover, rather than differences in photosynthetic properties, determined the species with the highest P G of both vascular plants and Sphagna. Species-specific contributions to the ecosystem P G varied over the growing season, which, in turn, determined the seasonal variation in ecosystem P G . The upscaled growing season P G estimate, 230 g C m −2 , agreed well with the GPP estimated by the EC (243 g C m −2 ).Sphagna were superior to vascular plants in ecosystemlevel P G throughout the growing season but had a lower P N . P N results indicated that areal cover of the species, together with their differences in photosynthetic parameters, shape the ecosystem-level C balance. Species with low areal cover but high photosynthetic efficiency appear to be potentially important for the ecosystem C sink. Results imply that functional diversity, i.e., the presence of plant groups with different seasonal timing and efficiency of photosynthesis, may increase the stability of C sinks of boreal bogs.

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General stabilizing effects of plant diversity on grassland productivity through population asynchrony and overyielding

Cited by 472 publications

References 29 publications

Network complexity and species traits mediate the effects of biological invasions on dynamic food webs

Network complexity and species traits mediate the effects of biological invasions on dynamic food webs

Biodiversity loss and its impact on humanity

Species-specific temporal variation in photosynthesis as a moderator of peatland carbon sequestration

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