Towards linking freshwater plants and ecosystems via functional biogeography

Iversen, Lars; Girón, Jorge García; Pan, Ying

doi:10.1016/j.aquabot.2021.103454

Cited by 12 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…Our results demonstrate the utility of functional island biogeography approaches (Alahuhta et al, 2021;Deák, Rádai, et al, 2020;Iversen et al, 2022;Schrader et al, 2021) in understanding and predicting the diversity of life strategies in temporary ponds, with important implications for pond conservation. Mapping the diversity of different life strategies (Borhidi, 1995;Grime, 1988) can provide a more refined understanding of how pond area and connectivity shape pond plant composition compared to general measures of total taxonomic richness.…”

Section: Con Clus Ionsmentioning

confidence: 71%

“…Even if species richness patterns were well known across a range of pond systems, emerging general conservation and restoration guidelines would be difficult if functional links between species and their environment were not recognized. Significant effort is being currently made in functional pond ecology to understand the interaction between organismal biology and community structure (Capers et al, 2010; Heino et al, 2015; Incagnone et al, 2015), and the determinants of functional trait variation in wetland environments (Iversen et al, 2022). In temporary ponds, a relatively high functional redundancy, that is, functional relative to taxonomic richness, was observed in aquatic invertebrates, along with a high beta diversity (Schriever & Lytle, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Small area and low connectivity constrain the diversity of plant life strategies in temporary ponds

Herceg‐Szórádi

Demeter²,

Csergő

2023

Diversity and Distributions

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Section: Con Clus Ionsmentioning

confidence: 71%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Small area and low connectivity constrain the diversity of plant life strategies in temporary ponds

Herceg‐Szórádi

Demeter²,

Csergő

2023

Diversity and Distributions

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“…We propose dedicated multitrait experiments to further examine these trait–trait relationships. Moreover, we advocate global initiatives to acquire a more comprehensive understanding of wetland/freshwater plant traits to investigate the complex processes of how environmental variables regulate plant trait expression under flooded conditions ( Iversen et al , 2021 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Leading trait dimensions in flood-tolerant plants

et al. 2022

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Background and Aims While trait-based approaches have provided critical insights in general plant functioning, we lack a comprehensive quantitative view on plant strategies in flooded conditions. Plants adapted to flooded conditions have specific traits (e.g., root porosity, low root/shoot ratio, and shoot elongation) to cope with the environmental stressors including anoxic sediments, and the subsequent presence of phytotoxic compounds. In flooded habitats, plants also respond to potential nutrient and light limitations, e.g., through the expression of leaf economics traits and size-related, respectively. However, we don’t know whether and how these trait dimensions are connected. Methods Based on a trait dataset compiled on 131 plant species from 141 studies in flooded habitats, we quantitatively analysed how flooding-induced traits are positioned in relation to the other two dominant trait dimensions; leaf economics and size-related traits. We evaluated how these key trait components are expressed along wetness gradients, across habitat types and among plant life forms. Key Results We found that flooding-induced traits constitute a trait dimension independent from leaf economics traits and size-related traits, indicating that there is no generic trade-off associated to flooding adaptations. Moreover, individual flooding-induced traits themselves are to a large extent decoupled from each other. These results suggest that adaptation to stressful environments, such as flooding, can be stressor-specific without generic adverse effects on plant functioning (e.g., causing trade-offs on leaf economics traits). Conclusions The trait expressions across multiple dimensions promote plant adaptations and co-existence across multi-faceted flooded environments. The decoupled trait dimensions, as related to different environmental drivers, also explain why ecosystem functioning (including e.g. methane emissions) are species- and habitat-specific. Thus, our results provide a backbone for applying trait-based approaches in wetland ecology by considering flooding-induced traits as an independent trait dimension.

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“…These two hypotheses (H2 and H3) are based on the insight that tropical communities have higher spatial turnover than their temperate counterparts due-in part-to less variable environmental conditions and longer evolutionary history in the absence of major ice ages at lower latitudes (Alahuhta et al, 2020;Janzen, 1967;Smith et al, 2020). Similarly, we predicted (H4) that contemporary climate would explain a substantial variation in the composition of freshwater plant ecoregions (Alahuhta et al, 2020;Alahuhta et al, 2021;Chappuis et al, 2012;García-Girón et al, 2020a;Heino, 2011;Heino, 2020b;Iversen et al, 2021), with topography, Pleistocene Ice Age legacies, human footprint, water alkalinity, availability of inland waterbodies and the surface area of individual regions playing supplementary role (Chappuis et al, 2014;Iversen et al, 2019;Lacoul & Freedman, 2006;Murphy et al, 2019Murphy et al, , 2020. This hypothesis originates from the latitudinal diversity gradient and Rapoport's rule, which posit that species occurring at lower latitudes, which have lower climatic seasonality and longer evolutionary legacies, are thermal specialists with narrower ranges (Currie et al, 2004), resulting also in higher species richness in and around the Tropics (Alahuhta et al, 2021;Murphy et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 86%

Patterns and mechanisms underlying ecoregion delineation in North American freshwater plants

Alahuhta

García‐Girón

2021

Journal of Biogeography

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Aim The regionalized patterns of biodiversity distributions are actively studied in terrestrial and marine ecosystems, but much less is known on the geographical patterns of ecoregions founded on freshwater taxa. Here, we studied, for the first time, how well existing freshwater ecoregions describe the geographical distribution of inland water plants. Location Greenland, continental Canada and USA. Taxon Freshwater vascular plants of all taxa and multiple functional groups (i.e. growth forms). Methods Using newly available fine‐grained data on freshwater plant distributions, we studied how ecoregions founded on fish are suitable for freshwater plant regionalization across North America. Specifically, we calculated internal homogeneity and distinctness among neighbouring ecoregions in relation to species replacements and richness differences. We also explored how a complex suite of ecogeographical characteristics affect ecoregion delineation of freshwater plants using spatially explicit regression routines. Results We found a clear geographical patterning of ecoregion robustness for North American freshwater plants, with communities being more internally homogeneous and more similar to one another in Polar and Subtropical inland waters. The degree of internal homogeneity and ecoregion distinctness were almost equally driven by species replacements and richness differences. Considering different life‐forms, ecoregion delineation performed best for emergent and floating‐leaved plants. Finally, within‐ecoregion homogeneity and distinctness were best explained by annual mean temperature and terrain ruggedness, respectively, with mean water alkalinity, ecoregion area and late Quaternary glacial legacies having supplementary effects. Main conclusions Our findings suggest that selection through climate filtering (e.g. mean annual temperature) is likely the main mechanistic driver of freshwater plant ecoregions. Geographical regionalizations founded on a particular organismal group may not be directly applicable for all taxa but can be a good basis for further adjustments. Our study is a promising starting point for further investigations of geographical delineations for freshwater taxa other than fish.

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Towards linking freshwater plants and ecosystems via functional biogeography

Cited by 12 publications

References 35 publications

Small area and low connectivity constrain the diversity of plant life strategies in temporary ponds

Small area and low connectivity constrain the diversity of plant life strategies in temporary ponds

Leading trait dimensions in flood-tolerant plants

Patterns and mechanisms underlying ecoregion delineation in North American freshwater plants

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