Increasing calcium scarcity along Afrotropical forest succession

Bauters, Marijn; Janssens, Ivan A.; Wasner, Daniel; Doetterl, Sebastian; Vermeir, Pieter; Griepentrog, Marco; Drake, Travis W.; Six, Johan; Barthel, Matti; Baumgartner, S.; Oost, Kristof Van; Makelele, Isaac Ahanamungu; Ewango, Corneille; Verheyen, Kris; Boeckx, Pascal

doi:10.1038/s41559-022-01810-2

Cited by 35 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 74 publications

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“…While studies of the effects of micronutrient limitation on plant growth are limited, our finding shows the importance of K concurs with a long-term fertilization experiment, in which K limited the growth of tree seedlings (Santiago et al, 2012). Similarly, a recent observational study highlighted the importance of K and also other nutrients, such as calcium and magnesium, in shaping tree community composition across topographic levels in an Amazonian forest (Vaz, 2021), and the importance of calcium has also been shown to constrain the secondary succession of an afrotropical forest (Bauters et al, 2022). Overall, these studies support the general F I G U R E 3 Level plot from a fourth corner generalized linear latent variable model including soil concentration of nitrogen (N), potassium (K), and available phosphorus (P) as environmental predictors of the tree community composition and interacting with wood density, leaf N concentration as a proportion (%) of dry mass, and leaf thickness, as the functional traits mediating tree species responses.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

“…While studies of the effects of micronutrient limitation on plant growth are limited, our finding shows the importance of K concurs with a long‐term fertilization experiment, in which K limited the growth of tree seedlings (Santiago et al, 2012). Similarly, a recent observational study highlighted the importance of K and also other nutrients, such as calcium and magnesium, in shaping tree community composition across topographic levels in an Amazonian forest (Vaz, 2021), and the importance of calcium has also been shown to constrain the secondary succession of an afrotropical forest (Bauters et al, 2022). Overall, these studies support the general hypothesis that multiple elements contribute to the co‐limitation of tropical forests (Kaspari, 2021; Kaspari & Powers, 2016).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

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Nutrient‐based species selection is a prevalent driver of community assembly and functional trait space in tropical forests

et al. 2023

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1. Soil nutrient availability and functional traits interact in complex ways during the assembly of tree communities hindering our understanding of the implications that this may have for their phylogenetic and functional diversity.2. We combined abundance, taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional trait data of 222 tree species distributed along nutrient concentration gradients at 24 plots in two tropical forest study sites. We analysed micro and macronutrient concentration in organic and topsoil horizons and tested for the following: (1) nutrientbased species sorting due to contrasting trait-environment relationships, (2) whether nutrient filtering has consequences for phylogenetic and functional diversity, and functional space size and occupancy and (3) we mapped trait distributions across the phylogeny of tree species to track the evolutionary signature of nutrient availability.3. We found that total nitrogen (N), available phosphorus and total potassium in soil accounted for 68% of the variation in tropical tree species community composition, with strong associations with nutrient concentration for 89% of the tree species included in the analysis. This nutrient-based species selection was mediated by interactions between the three soil nutrient concentrations with leaf nitrogen, leaf thickness and wood density. Soil N concentration was positively | 1219

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Nutrient‐based species selection is a prevalent driver of community assembly and functional trait space in tropical forests

et al. 2023

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“…2a). Soil P availability increases as succession proceeds (Zhang et al ., 2016; Liu et al ., 2021; Zhu et al ., 2021; Bauters et al ., 2022). The higher soil P availability enables the late pioneer species to invest less C in establishing symbiotic relationships with mycorrhizal fungi for P acquisition and more in improving the physiological uptake efficiency of ammonium.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…nitrate) decrease while immobile nutrients (e.g. ammonium and available P) increase as succession proceeds (Kronzucker et al ., 1997; Bauters et al ., 2022). Species at earlier successional stages may be biased towards root–fungal collaborations to forage for immobile nutrient and belowground amount‐related trait investment to intercept mobile nutrients.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Complementary belowground strategies underlie species coexistence in an early successional forest

Liu

Yang

et al. 2023

New Phytologist

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Summary Unravelling belowground strategies is critical for understanding species coexistence and successional dynamics; yet, our knowledge of nutrient acquisition strategies of forest species at different successional stages remains limited. We measured morphological (diameter, specific root length, and root tissue density), architectural (branching ratio), physiological (ammonium, nitrate, and glycine uptake rates) root traits, and mycorrhizal colonisation rates of eight coexisting woody species in an early successional plantation forest in subtropical China. By incorporating physiological uptake efficiency, we revealed a bi‐dimensional root economics space comprising of an ‘amount‐efficiency’ dimension represented by morphological and physiological traits, and a ‘self‐symbiosis’ dimension dominated by architectural and mycorrhizal traits. The early pioneer species relied on root–fungal symbiosis, developing densely branched roots with high mycorrhizal colonisation rates for foraging mobile soil nitrate. The late pioneer species invested in roots themselves and allocated effort towards improving uptake efficiency of less‐mobile ammonium. Within the root economics space, the covariation of axes with soil phosphorus availability also distinguished the strategy preference of the two successional groups. These results demonstrate the importance of incorporating physiological uptake efficiency into root economics space, and reveal a trade‐off between expanding soil physical space exploration and improving physiological uptake efficiency for successional species coexistence in forests.

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“…One explanation of limiting soil nutrients varying with tree size could be that medium to large trees in the overstory are more efficient at trapping nutrients from atmospheric deposition in contrast to small trees in the understory. Indeed Bauters et al (2022) showed for a secondary forest in the DRC that these atmospheric depositions were sufficient to meet the phosphorus needs of the trees but insufficient for their calcium needs.…”

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confidence: 99%

Competition and site weakly explain tree growth variability in undisturbed Central African moist forests

Gourlet‐Fleury,

Rossi,

Forni

et al. 2023

Journal of Ecology

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Identifying and quantifying factors that influence tree growth are crucial issues to ensure sustainable forest management, particularly in moist tropical forests. Tree growth depends on several factors comprising ontogenic stage, competition by neighbours and environmental conditions. Several studies have focused on one or two of them, but very few have considered all three, especially in Central Africa. We investigated the effects of diameter and competition on tree growth, in four Central African sites characterized by their soil physicochemical properties, at both tree community and population levels. We calibrated growth models using diameter data collected on 29,741 trees between 2015 and 2018, on twelve 4 or 9‐ha plots spread over the four sites. These models included diameter, wood density, competition indices and site effect as explainable variables at the community level and excluded wood density at the population level. At the community level, the best models explained 11% of growth variability with a decreasing effect of species wood density, diameter, site and competition. Our results show that even if low, site effect can result from different soil nutrients depending on both tree size and species wood density. We observed higher tree growth on sites with (i) high exchangeable K, organic C, total N and total P for low wood density species; (ii) high available P and C:N for small trees, high exchangeable Ca and Mg for medium to large trees, all belonging to medium and hard wood density species. At the population level, the best models explained between 0 to 43% of growth variability, with significant competition effect (resp. site effect) for 21 (resp. 9) of the 43 species studied. Site ranking varied greatly between the 9 species concerned, probably reflecting different sensitivities to the scarcity of particular soil nutrients. Synthesis. Our study provides original results on the factors influencing tree growth in Central Africa, showing that the potential effect of soil nutrients depends on tree size and species wood density. Remaining highly unpredictable at the population level, this effect makes it essential to increase the number of dynamics monitoring systems in logging concessions.

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Increasing calcium scarcity along Afrotropical forest succession

Cited by 35 publications

References 74 publications

Nutrient‐based species selection is a prevalent driver of community assembly and functional trait space in tropical forests

Nutrient‐based species selection is a prevalent driver of community assembly and functional trait space in tropical forests

Complementary belowground strategies underlie species coexistence in an early successional forest

Competition and site weakly explain tree growth variability in undisturbed Central African moist forests

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