Plant-soil feedbacks contribute to coexistence when considering multispecies assemblages over a soil depth gradient.

ABSTRACT: Plant-soil feedbacks (PSFs) may determine plant-species coexistence. They may stabilize coexistence, but frequently destabilize it by increasing fitness differences between species. Most studies focus on pairwise models in greenhouses. Thus, whether PSFs favor or deter coexistence is still unclear, especially in multispecies field contexts. We analyzed pairwise and multispecies coexistence over a hydric gradient in a semiarid grassland. Using PSF strength estimates between 17 species, we measured stability and fitness differences between all species pairs, and built all possible multispecies communities to test computationally whether they were stabilized by PSFs. We analyzed whether coexistence probability diminishes with species richness, as previously hypothesized. Because PSFs change w

SUBMITTER: Martorell C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11894246 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature