Species niches, not traits, determine abundance and occupancy patterns: A multi‐site synthesis

Marino, Nicholas A. C.; Céréghino, Régis; Gilbert, Benjamin; Petermann, Jana S.; Srivastava, Diane S.; Omena, Paula M. de; Bautista, Fabiola Ospina; Guzman, Laura Melissa; Romero, Gustavo Q.; Trzcinski, M. Kurtis; Barberis, Ignacio M.; Corbara, Bruno; Debastiani, Vanderlei J.; Dézerald, Olivier; Kratina, Pavel; Leroy, Céline; MacDonald, Arthur Andrew Meahan; Montero, Guillermo; Pillar, Valério D.; Richardson, Barbara A.; Richardson, M.J.; Talaga, Stanislas; Gonçalves, Ana Zangirólame; Piccoli, Gustavo C. O.; Jocqué, Merlijn; Farjalla, Vinicius F.

doi:10.1111/geb.13029

Cited by 16 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…We found contrasting AORs for native and alien woody species, providing evidence that widespread native species are usually locally abundant, whereas widespread alien species may be either locally abundant or rare. Our results for native species in an island setting are consistent with previous studies on plants from temperate and tropical regions (Blackburn et al, 2006;Arellano & Macía, 2014;Díaz et al, 2020;Marino et al, 2020), which are largely drawn from continental contexts (but see Buckley & Freckleton, 2010). The decoupled relationship between abundance and occupancy that we observed for alien woody species, however, appears to be an exception to the general rule that AORs are positive, even for alien species (Holt & Gaston, 2003;Buckley & Freckleton, 2010;Rigal et al, 2013;Sarabeev et al, 2018;Miranda & Killgore, 2019).…”

Section: Contrasting Abundance-occupancy Relationshipssupporting

confidence: 91%

Niche properties constrain occupancy but not abundance patterns of native and alien woody species across Hawaiian forests

Craven

Weigelt

Wolkis

et al. 2021

J Vegetation Science

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Questions Islands harbour a disproportionate amount of global plant diversity, yet their unique native assemblages are particularly vulnerable to biological invasions. It is therefore critical to identify the macroecological constraints that mediate spatial distributions of alien species on islands. Here, we examined abundance–occupancy relationships of native and alien woody plant species, and the role of niche properties and functional traits related to dispersal and competition in shaping occupancy and abundance patterns. Location Hawaiian Islands. Methods We calculated relative abundance and occupancy for 64 woody species (42 natives, 22 naturalized aliens), and estimated each species' niche breadth and position. We fitted phylogenetic hierarchical Bayesian models to evaluate abundance–occupancy relationships and the impacts of niche properties and functional traits on occupancy and abundance of native and alien species. Results Our analyses revealed that locally more abundant native species were also more widespread, but that the abundance of alien species was unrelated to their occupancy. Yet, we found evidence that alien species with longer residence times on the Hawaiian Islands were more widespread. While widespread native and alien woody species both had broad niches, widespread alien woody species exhibited a tendency to occur in more marginal niche positions than widespread native woody species. Niche properties did not affect abundances of either native or alien woody species. Traits associated with dispersal capacity and competitive ability had minimal impacts on either occupancy or abundance of native and alien woody species. Conclusions We found that niche properties shape the occupancy but not the abundance of native and alien woody species across Hawaiian forests. Our results suggest that, because of substantial invasion debts, the impacts of alien woody invasions in native forests have yet to fully manifest.

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Section: Contrasting Abundance-occupancy Relationshipssupporting

confidence: 91%

Niche properties constrain occupancy but not abundance patterns of native and alien woody species across Hawaiian forests

Craven

Weigelt

Wolkis

et al. 2021

J Vegetation Science

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“…So far, the majority of studies have focused on single traits rather than on trait combinations or trait syndromes (but see Díaz et al, 2016; Guo et al, 2018) as predictors of large and local distribution patterns. However, no single trait can completely describe a species’ ecological strategy (Winemiller et al, 2015; Marino et al, 2020). Rather, species’ local abundance and broad‐scale distribution patterns might be affected by different sets of traits (Marino et al, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, no single trait can completely describe a species’ ecological strategy (Winemiller et al, 2015; Marino et al, 2020). Rather, species’ local abundance and broad‐scale distribution patterns might be affected by different sets of traits (Marino et al, 2020). It has been suggested that locally rare and geographically restricted plant species differ systematically from more common species in functional traits that are related to species’ productivity, competitive ability, dispersal, regeneration and persistence (Murray et al, 2002).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Different sets of traits explain abundance and distribution patterns of European plants at different spatial scales

Sporbert

Welk

Seidler

et al. 2021

J Vegetation Science

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“…Even though flooding is the most important environmental characteristic driving species distribution in the plot, the fundamental niche of the three Myrcia species potentially encompasses a much wider variation of conditions than the environments of the study site, as the species occur in different vegetation types and are not restricted to areas subject to flooding at the geographic scale (Appendix ). Thus, in the white‐sand forest studied, the species can use the most common environmental condition (niche position, Marino et al., 2019) and patches subject to flooding may work as areas of refuge from strong competitors and/or natural enemies (Baraloto et al., 2007), which drives the species’ realized niche. The same reasoning may apply to other species in the community, because most occur in both flooded and dry patches within the study plot (Appendix ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Habitat filtering drives the local distribution of congeneric species in a Brazilian white‐sand flooded tropical forest

Ribeiro

Martins

Wiegand

et al. 2021

Ecology and Evolution

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The investigation of ecological processes that maintain species coexistence is revealing in naturally disturbed environments such as the white‐sand tropical forest, which is subject to periodic flooding that might pose strong habitat filtering to tree species. Congeneric species are a good model to investigate the relative importance of ecological processes that maintain high species diversity because they tend to exploit the same limiting resources and/or have similar tolerance limits to the same environmental conditions due to their close phylogenetic relationship. We aim to find evidence for the action and relative importance of different processes hypothesized to maintain species coexistence in a white‐sand flooded forest in Brazil, taking advantage of data on the detailed spatial structure of populations of congeneric species. Individuals of three Myrcia species were tagged, mapped, and measured for diameter at soil height in a 1‐ha plot. We also sampled seven environmental variables in the plot. We employed several spatial point process models to investigate the possible action of habitat filtering, interspecific competition, and dispersal limitation. Habitat filtering was the most important process driving the local distribution of the three Myrcia species, as they showed associations, albeit of different strength, to environmental variables related to flooding. We did not detect spatial patterns, such as spatial segregation and smaller size of nearby neighbors, that would be consistent with interspecific competition among the three congeneric species and other co‐occurring species. Even though congeners were spatially independent, they responded to differences in the environment. Last, dispersal limitation only led to spatial associations of different size classes for one of the species. Given that white‐sand flooded forests are highly threatened in Brazil, the preservation of their different habitats is of utmost importance to the maintenance of high species richness, as flooding drives the distribution of species in the community.

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Species niches, not traits, determine abundance and occupancy patterns: A multi‐site synthesis

Cited by 16 publications

References 55 publications

Niche properties constrain occupancy but not abundance patterns of native and alien woody species across Hawaiian forests

Niche properties constrain occupancy but not abundance patterns of native and alien woody species across Hawaiian forests

Different sets of traits explain abundance and distribution patterns of European plants at different spatial scales

Habitat filtering drives the local distribution of congeneric species in a Brazilian white‐sand flooded tropical forest

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