The Fight to Capture Light: Functional Diversity Is Related to Aquatic Plant Community Productivity Likely by Enhancing Light Capture

Angove, Charlotte; Norkko, Alf; Gustafsson, Camilla

doi:10.3389/fmars.2020.00140

Cited by 9 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 79 publications

(131 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The maximum height and RGR-AGB of V. natans were significantly higher in the N treatment than for M. spicatum, which might reflect that rosetteforming macrophytes 1) usually exhibit a weaker ability to increase plant height in N stress environments, as demonstrated for V. natans by Yu et al (2017;, and 2) mainly grow by making physiological adjustments to tolerate stress conditions, such as adjusting the metabolisms of carbon and nitrogen (Yuan et al, 2016;Chen et al, 2020b), rather than by increasing plant height. Canopy-forming macrophytes, by contrast, usually elongate their shoots towards the water surface to capture light for growing (Yu et al, 2018;Angove et al, 2020). Consistent with previous studies, the high maximum height in our experiment enabled the shoots of M. spicatum to easily reach the water surface where they formed a canopy allowing them to maintain a competitive advantage in the presence of F and N stressors.…”

Section: Effects Of Fish Disturbance and Ammonium Loading On Submerse...supporting

confidence: 89%

“…Submersed macrophytes with different growth forms respond differently to stress induced by high ammonium (NH 4 -N) loading and low light conditions. For example, canopy-forming species are more tolerant to high NH 4 -N (<7 mg L −1 ) than rosette-forming species (Yu et al, 2022), because the former can form a canopy on the water surface, whereas rosette-forming species disperse under water through stolons (Xiao et al, 2006;Li, 2014;Angove et al, 2020). The canopy-forming species can, therefore, capture sufficient light, and plenty of light may relieve plants from NH 4 -related physiological stress, as suggested in previous mesocosm experiments (Cao et al, 2011;Yuan et al, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Interactive effects of benthivorous fish disturbance and ammonium loading on two submersed macrophytes of contrasting growth forms based on a mesocosm study

Wang

Liu

et al. 2022

Front. Environ. Sci.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Benthivorous fish disturbance and nitrogen loading are two important factors that influence the community structure of submersed macrophytes, but their interactive effect is not well elucidated. We conducted an outdoor mesocosm experiment to examine the individual and combined effects of these two factors on the growth of two submersed macrophytes of different growth forms, i.e., the rosette-forming Vallisneria natans and the canopy-forming Myriophyllum spicatum. The treatments involved two levels of fish (Carassius auratus) disturbance crossed with two levels (0 and 12 g NH4Cl per month) of ammonium (NH4+-N) loading. For M. spicatum, we found that maximum height (MH) was reduced by 30.7%, 26.4%, and 51.0% in fish addition alone (F) and nitrogen addition treatments (N, F + N), respectively, compared with the control (C) treatment. The density of M. spicatum declined by 20%, 62% and 68.8% in the F, N and F + N treatment. The above-ground biomass (AGB) of M. spicatum respectively reduced by 56.7%, 94%, and 96.5% in the F, N and F + N treatments, and the roots/shoots ratio (R/S) increased by 114%, and 176% in N and N + F treatments, respectively. Regarding V. natans, only the MH in the N treatment was reduced (71.9%), and the density exhibited a reduction of 59.1% and 64.5% in the N and F + N treatments, respectively. The AGB of V. natans was significantly lower in the N (90.3%) and N + F (78.4%) treatments compared with the C treatment, while increased by 60.3% in F treatment. The R/S of V. natans increased by 227%, and 74.4% in the N and F + N treatments compared with the C treatment. The interactive effect of fish disturbance and high N on MH and AGB of V. natans and density of M. spicatum were antagonistic. However, the interactive effect on density and BGB of V. natans and AGB of M. spicatum were negatively synergistic. Moreover, fish activity significantly increased the concentration of total suspended solids (TSS) in the water, while total nitrogen (TN), ammonium, total phosphorus (TP), light, pH and salinity were unaffected. When fish and nitrogen were combined, TN, TP, TSS and salinity increased significantly, while pH decreased. Our study reveals that the interactive effects of fish disturbance and high N are synergistic and/or antagonistic, suggesting that the same stressor interaction may vary from synergistic to antagonistic depending on the response variables and growth forms of the macrophytes examined. Our study contributes to the understanding of how different factors can interact with each other and affect submersed macrophytes in aquatic ecosystems. This is timely and relevant knowledge, considering the range of multiple stressors involved in the decline of aquatic ecosystems worldwide at present.

show abstract

Section: Effects Of Fish Disturbance and Ammonium Loading On Submerse...supporting

confidence: 89%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Interactive effects of benthivorous fish disturbance and ammonium loading on two submersed macrophytes of contrasting growth forms based on a mesocosm study

Wang

Liu

et al. 2022

Front. Environ. Sci.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…However, a deep and sound understanding of macrophytes functioning and dynamics along environmental gradients (e.g., trophic and depth) is still needed to prevent their decline (Azzella et al, 2017;Ghirardi et al, 2019;Angove et al, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The importance of being petioled: leaf traits and resource-use strategies in Nuphar lutea

Vecchia

Bolpagni

2022

Hydrobiologia

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Intraspecific trait variability (ITV) can be considerably high and reveal plant local adaptation. The aim of this study is to investigate ITV of leaf traits (including petioles) in a rooted floating-leaved macrophyte (Nuphar lutea) at the local scale. We expected to see changes in resource-use strategies in relation to water and sediment properties. 96 leaves were sampled in a hyper-eutrophic shallow lake in central Italy, together with environmental parameters. Results highlight the influence of water depth and sediments in modulating environmental conditions and thus leaf traits. Leaf area and fresh and dry weight increased with water depth, a relation that catches the construction costs of petioles. The negative relation found between specific petiole area and conductivity suggests a stress imposed by high nutrient availability which triggers unfavorable conditions for N. lutea. We demonstrated the relevance of petiole traits for a rooted macrophyte. Petiole aerenchyma or photosynthetic extra surfaces fundamentally contribute to fit the environment, opening new questions for the functional investigation of macrophytes. Excluding petioles in the assessment of leaf traits reduces the possibility to understand the ecological/adaptive processes of nympheids. New data are urgently needed to increase the number of data and species to be analyzed.

show abstract

“…In the case of habitat provision for fishes, trait complementarity had no effect, while the dominance of structurally more complex plants positively affected fish abundance ( Jones et al., 2021 ). In the case of primary production, dominance of taller plants with bigger leaves positively affected production ( Angove et al., 2020 ), while complementarity was discarded as a significant driver.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A trait-based framework for seagrass ecology: Trends and prospects

et al. 2023

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In the last three decades, quantitative approaches that rely on organism traits instead of taxonomy have advanced different fields of ecological research through establishing the mechanistic links between environmental drivers, functional traits, and ecosystem functions. A research subfield where trait-based approaches have been frequently used but poorly synthesized is the ecology of seagrasses; marine angiosperms that colonized the ocean 100M YA and today make up productive yet threatened coastal ecosystems globally. Here, we compiled a comprehensive trait-based response-effect framework (TBF) which builds on previous concepts and ideas, including the use of traits for the study of community assembly processes, from dispersal and response to abiotic and biotic factors, to ecosystem function and service provision. We then apply this framework to the global seagrass literature, using a systematic review to identify the strengths, gaps, and opportunities of the field. Seagrass trait research has mostly focused on the effect of environmental drivers on traits, i.e., “environmental filtering” (72%), whereas links between traits and functions are less common (26.9%). Despite the richness of trait-based data available, concepts related to TBFs are rare in the seagrass literature (15% of studies), including the relative importance of neutral and niche assembly processes, or the influence of trait dominance or complementarity in ecosystem function provision. These knowledge gaps indicate ample potential for further research, highlighting the need to understand the links between the unique traits of seagrasses and the ecosystem services they provide.

show abstract

The Fight to Capture Light: Functional Diversity Is Related to Aquatic Plant Community Productivity Likely by Enhancing Light Capture

Cited by 9 publications

References 79 publications

Interactive effects of benthivorous fish disturbance and ammonium loading on two submersed macrophytes of contrasting growth forms based on a mesocosm study

Interactive effects of benthivorous fish disturbance and ammonium loading on two submersed macrophytes of contrasting growth forms based on a mesocosm study

The importance of being petioled: leaf traits and resource-use strategies in Nuphar lutea

A trait-based framework for seagrass ecology: Trends and prospects

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About