Can environmental constraints determine random patterns of plant species co-occurrence?

ABSTRACT: Plant community ecologists use the null model approach to infer assembly processes from observed patterns of species co-occurrence. In about a third of published studies, the null hypothesis of random assembly cannot be rejected. When this occurs, plant ecologists interpret that the observed random pattern is not environmentally constrained - but probably generated by stochastic processes. The null model approach (using the C-score and the discrepancy index) was used to test for random assembly under two simulation algorithms. Logistic regression, distance-based redundancy analysis, and constrained ordination were used to test for environmental determinism (species segregation along environmental gradients or turnover and species aggregation). This article introduces an environmentally det

SUBMITTER: Garcia-Baquero G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4364823 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature