| 1. |
- Kattge, Jens, et al.
(author)
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TRY plant trait database - enhanced coverage and open access
- 2020
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In: Global Change Biology. - : Wiley-Blackwell. - 1354-1013 .- 1365-2486. ; 26:1, s. 119-188
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Plant traits-the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants-determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait-based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits-almost complete coverage for 'plant growth form'. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait-environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives.
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| 2. |
- MacDougall, Andrew S., et al.
(author)
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Widening global variability in grassland biomass since the 1980s
- 2024
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In: Nature Ecology & Evolution. - : Springer Nature. - 2397-334X.
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Global change is associated with variable shifts in the annual production of aboveground plant biomass, suggesting localized sensitivities with unclear causal origins. Combining remotely sensed normalized difference vegetation index data since the 1980s with contemporary field data from 84 grasslands on 6 continents, we show a widening divergence in site-level biomass ranging from +51% to −34% globally. Biomass generally increased in warmer, wetter and species-rich sites with longer growing seasons and declined in species-poor arid areas. Phenological changes were widespread, revealing substantive transitions in grassland seasonal cycling. Grazing, nitrogen deposition and plant invasion were prevalent in some regions but did not predict overall trends. Grasslands are undergoing sizable changes in production, with implications for food security, biodiversity and carbon storage especially in arid regions where declines are accelerating.
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| 3. |
- Falster, Daniel, et al.
(author)
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AusTraits, a curated plant trait database for the Australian flora
- 2021
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In: Scientific Data. - : Nature Portfolio. - 2052-4463. ; 8:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We introduce the AusTraits database - a compilation of values of plant traits for taxa in the Australian flora (hereafter AusTraits). AusTraits synthesises data on 448 traits across 28,640 taxa from field campaigns, published literature, taxonomic monographs, and individual taxon descriptions. Traits vary in scope from physiological measures of performance (e.g. photosynthetic gas exchange, water-use efficiency) to morphological attributes (e.g. leaf area, seed mass, plant height) which link to aspects of ecological variation. AusTraits contains curated and harmonised individual- and species-level measurements coupled to, where available, contextual information on site properties and experimental conditions. This article provides information on version 3.0.2 of AusTraits which contains data for 997,808 trait-by-taxon combinations. We envision AusTraits as an ongoing collaborative initiative for easily archiving and sharing trait data, which also provides a template for other national or regional initiatives globally to fill persistent gaps in trait knowledge.
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| 4. |
- Smith, Annabel L., et al.
(author)
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Global gene flow releases invasive plants from environmental constraints on genetic diversity
- 2020
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In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. - : Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. - 0027-8424 .- 1091-6490. ; 117:8, s. 4218-4227
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- When plants establish outside their native range, their ability to adapt to the new environment is influenced by both demography and dispersal. However, the relative importance of these two factors is poorly understood. To quantify the influence of demography and dispersal on patterns of genetic diversity underlying adaptation, we used data from a globally distributed demographic research network comprising 35 native and 18 nonnative populations of Plantago lanceolata. Species-specific simulation experiments showed that dispersal would dilute demographic influences on genetic diversity at local scales. Populations in the native European range had strong spatial genetic structure associated with geographic distance and precipitation seasonality. In contrast, nonnative populations had weaker spatial genetic structure that was not associated with environmental gradients but with higher within-population genetic diversity. Our findings show that dispersal caused by repeated, long-distance, human-mediated introductions has allowed invasive plant populations to overcome environmental constraints on genetic diversity, even without strong demographic changes. The impact of invasive plants may, therefore, increase with repeated introductions, highlighting the need to constrain future introductions of species even if they already exist in an area.
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| 5. |
- Villellas, Jesus, et al.
(author)
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Phenotypic plasticity masks range-wide genetic differentiation for vegetative but not reproductive traits in a short-lived plant
- 2021
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In: Ecology Letters. - : Wiley. - 1461-023X .- 1461-0248. ; 24:11, s. 2378-2393
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Genetic differentiation and phenotypic plasticity jointly shape intraspecific trait variation, but their roles differ among traits. In short-lived plants, reproductive traits may be more genetically determined due to their impact on fitness, whereas vegetative traits may show higher plasticity to buffer short-term perturbations. Combining a multi-treatment greenhouse experiment with observational field data throughout the range of a widespread short-lived herb, Plantago lanceolata, we (1) disentangled genetic and plastic responses of functional traits to a set of environmental drivers and (2) assessed how genetic differentiation and plasticity shape observational trait–environment relationships. Reproductive traits showed distinct genetic differentiation that largely determined observational patterns, but only when correcting traits for differences in biomass. Vegetative traits showed higher plasticity and opposite genetic and plastic responses, masking the genetic component underlying field-observed trait variation. Our study suggests that genetic differentiation may be inferred from observational data only for the traits most closely related to fitness.
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| 6. |
- Catford, Jane A., et al.
(author)
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Drowned, buried and carried away : effects of plant traits on the distribution of native and alien species in riparian ecosystems
- 2014
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In: New Phytologist. - : Wiley. - 0028-646X .- 1469-8137. ; 204:1, s. 19-36
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Riparian vegetation is exposed to stress from inundation and hydraulic disturbance, and is often rich in native and alien plant species. We describe 35 traits that enable plants to cope with riparian conditions. These include traits for tolerating or avoiding anoxia and enabling underwater photosynthesis, traits that confer resistance and resilience to hydraulic disturbance, and attributes that facilitate dispersal, such as floating propagules. This diversity of life-history strategies illustrates that there are many ways of sustaining life in riparian zones, which helps to explain high riparian biodiversity. Using community assembly theory, we examine how adaptations to inundation, disturbance and dispersal shape plant community composition along key environmental gradients, and how human actions have modified communities. Dispersal-related processes seem to explain many patterns, highlighting the influence of regional processes on local species assemblages. Using alien plant invasions like an (uncontrolled) experiment in community assembly, we use an Australian and a global dataset to examine possible causes of high degrees of riparian invasion. We found that high proportions of alien species in the regional species pools have invaded riparian zones, despite not being riparian specialists, and that riparian invaders disperse in more ways, including by water and humans, than species invading other ecosystems.
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| 7. |
- Catford, Jane A., et al.
(author)
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Reducing redundancy in invasion ecology by integrating hypotheses into a single theoretical framework
- 2009
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In: Diversity & distributions. - : Wiley. - 1366-9516 .- 1472-4642. ; 15:1, s. 22-40
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Aim: Invasion ecology includes many hypotheses. Empirical evidence suggests that most of these can explain the success of some invaders to some degree in some circumstances. If they all are correct, what does this tell us about invasion? We illustrate the major themes in invasion ecology, and provide an overarching framework that helps organize research and foster links among subfields of invasion ecology and ecology more generally.Location: Global.Methods: We review and synthesize 29 leading hypotheses in plant invasion ecology. Structured around propagule pressure (P), abiotic characteristics (A) and biotic characteristics (B), with the additional influence of humans (H) on P, A and B (hereon PAB), we show how these hypotheses fit into one paradigm. P is based on the size and frequency of introductions, A incorporates ecosystem invasibility based on physical conditions, and B includes the characteristics of invading species (invasiveness), the recipient community and their interactions. Having justified the PAB framework, we propose a way in which invasion research could progress.Results: By highlighting the common ground among hypotheses, we show that invasion ecology is encumbered by theoretical redundancy that can be removed through integration. Using both holistic and incremental approaches, we show how the PAB framework can guide research and quantify the relative importance of different invasion mechanisms.Main conclusions: If the prime aim is to identify the main cause of invasion success, we contend that a top-down approach that focuses on PAB maximizes research efficiency. This approach identifies the most influential factors first, and subsequently narrows the number of potential causal mechanisms. By viewing invasion as a multifaceted process that can be partitioned into major drivers and broken down into a series of sequential steps, invasion theory can be rigorously tested, understanding improved and effective weed management techniques identified.
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| 8. |
- Dawson, Samantha K., et al.
(author)
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Remote Sensing Measures Restoration Successes, but Canopy Heights Lag in Restoring Floodplain Vegetation
- 2016
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In: Remote Sensing. - : MDPI AG. - 2072-4292. ; 8:7
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Wetlands worldwide are becoming increasingly degraded, and this has motivated many attempts to manage and restore wetland ecosystems. Restoration actions require a large resource investment, so it is critical to measure the outcomes of these management actions. We evaluated the restoration of floodplain wetland vegetation across a chronosequence of land uses, using remote sensing analyses. We compared the Landsat-based fractional cover of restoration areas with river red gum and lignum reference communities, which functioned as a fixed target for restoration, over three time periods: (i) before agricultural land use (1987-1997); (ii) during the peak of agricultural development (2004-2007); and (iii) post-restoration of flooding (2010-2015). We also developed LiDAR-derived canopy height models (CHMs) for comparison over the second and third time periods. Inundation was crucial for restoration, with many fields showing little sign of similarity to target vegetation until after inundation, even if agricultural land uses had ceased. Fields cleared or cultivated for only one year had greater restoration success compared to areas cultivated for three or more years. Canopy height increased most in the fields that were cleared and cultivated for a short duration, in contrast to those cultivated for >12 years, which showed few signs of recovery. Restoration was most successful in fields with a short development duration after the intervention, but resulting dense monotypic stands of river cooba require future monitoring and possibly intervention to prevent sustained dominance. Fields with intensive land use histories may need to be managed as alternative, drier flood-dependent vegetation communities, such as black box (Eucalyptus largiflorens) grasslands. Remotely-sensed data provided a powerful measurement technique for tracking restoration success over a large floodplain.
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| 9. |
- Shackelford, Nancy, et al.
(author)
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Isolation predicts compositional change after discrete disturbances in a global meta-study
- 2017
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In: Ecography. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0906-7590 .- 1600-0587. ; 40:11, s. 1256-1266
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Globally, anthropogenic disturbances are occurring at unprecedented rates and over extensive spatial and temporal scales. Human activities also affect natural disturbances, prompting shifts in their timing and intensities. Thus, there is an urgent need to understand and predict the response of ecosystems to disturbance. In this study, we investigated whether there are general determinants of community response to disturbance across different community types, locations, and disturbance events. We compiled 14 case studies of community response to disturbance from four continents, twelve aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem types, and eight different types of disturbance. We used community compositional differences and species richness to indicate community response. We used mixed-effects modeling to test the relationship between each of these response metrics and four potential explanatory factors: regional species pool size, isolation, number of generations passed, and relative disturbance intensity. We found that compositional similarity was higher between pre- and post-disturbance communities when the disturbed community was connected to adjacent undisturbed habitat. The number of generations that had passed since the disturbance event was a significant, but weak, predictor of community compositional change; two communities were responsible for the observed relationship. We found no significant relationships between the factors we tested and changes in species richness. To our knowledge, this is the first attempt to search for general drivers of community resilience from a diverse set of case studies. The strength of the relationship between compositional change and isolation suggests that it may be informative in resilience research and biodiversity management.
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