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A CO2 Concentration Gradient Facility for Testing CO2 Enrichment and Soil Effects on Grassland Ecosystem Function

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Published on: November 21, 2015

Predicting individual plant performance in grasslands.

Katharina Herz¹, Sophie Dietz², Sylvia Haider^1,3

¹Institute of Biology/Geobotany and Botanical Garden Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg Halle Germany.

Ecology and Evolution

|November 28, 2017

Summary

Individual plant performance in grasslands is best predicted by the plant's own functional traits, which capture environmental and neighborhood conditions. This highlights the importance of intrinsic plant characteristics for understanding grassland ecology.

Keywords:

biodiversity exploratories community‐weighted means functional diversity local neighborhood phytometer plant performance

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Area of Science:

Ecology
Plant Science
Trait-based Ecology

Background:

Plant functional traits predict community productivity but rarely individual performance in grasslands.
Understanding individual plant success requires evaluating traits against environmental and neighborhood factors.

Purpose of the Study:

To determine the relative importance of plant traits, environmental conditions, and neighborhood characteristics in predicting individual plant performance in grasslands.
To assess if functional traits can predict individual plant success under realistic field conditions.

Main Methods:

20 grassland species were planted as phytometers in diverse land-use intensity sites.
Individual plant performance (biomass) and functional traits were measured after one year.
Community-weighted means (CWM) and functional diversity (FD) of neighborhood traits were calculated.

Main Results:

Individual phytometer traits explained the most variation in plant performance (19.30%-44.73%).
Land-use intensity was the only significant environmental predictor.
Neighborhood functional characteristics (CWM and FD) improved models but had smaller effect sizes than individual traits.

Conclusions:

Individual plant functional traits are strong predictors of performance in grassland ecosystems.
Traits implicitly account for environmental and neighborhood influences on plant success.
This emphasizes the utility of trait-based approaches for predicting individual plant performance.