Plant functional traits and the multidimensional nature of species coexistence.

ABSTRACT: Understanding the processes maintaining species diversity is a central problem in ecology, with implications for the conservation and management of ecosystems. Although biologists often assume that trait differences between competitors promote diversity, empirical evidence connecting functional traits to the niche differences that stabilize species coexistence is rare. Obtaining such evidence is critical because traits also underlie the average fitness differences driving competitive exclusion, and this complicates efforts to infer community dynamics from phenotypic patterns. We coupled field-parameterized mathematical models of competition between 102 pairs of annual plants with detailed sampling of leaf, seed, root, and whole-plant functional traits to relate phenotypic differences to st

SUBMITTER: Kraft NJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4311865 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature