Environmental variation drives the decoupling of leaf and root traits within species along an elevation gradient.

ABSTRACT:

Background and aims

Plant performance is enhanced by balancing above- and below-ground resource uptake through the intraspecific adjustment of leaf and root traits. It is assumed that these organ adjustments are at least partly coordinated, so that analogous leaf and root traits broadly covary. Understanding the extent of such intraspecific leaf-root trait covariation would strongly contribute to our understanding of how plants match above- and below-ground resource use strategies as their environment changes, but comprehensive studies are lacking.

Methods

We measured analogous leaf and root traits from 11 species, as well as climate, soil and vegetation properties along a 1000-m elevation gradient in the French Alps. We determined how traits varied along the gradient, to wh

SUBMITTER: Weemstra M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9486920 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature