Stochastic assembly in a subtropical forest chronosequence: evidence from contrasting changes of species, phylogenetic and functional dissimilarity over succession

Abstract

Deterministic and stochastic processes jointly determine the community dynamics of forest succession. However, it has been widely held in previous studies that deterministic processes dominate forest succession. Furthermore, inference of mechanisms for community assembly may be misleading if based on a single axis of diversity alone. In this study, we evaluated the relative roles of deterministic and stochastic processes along a disturbance gradient by integrating species, functional, and phylogenetic beta diversity in a subtropical forest chronosequence in Southeastern China. We found a general pattern of increasing species turnover, but little-to-no change in phylogenetic and functional turnover over succession at two spatial scales. Meanwhile, the phylogenetic and functional beta diversity were not significantly different from random expectation. This result suggested a dominance of stochastic assembly, contrary to the general expectation that deterministic processes dominate forest succession. On the other hand, we found significant interactions of environment and disturbance and limited evidence for significant deviations of phylogenetic or functional turnover from random expectations for different size classes. This result provided weak evidence of deterministic processes over succession. Stochastic assembly of forest succession suggests that post-disturbance restoration may be largely unpredictable and difficult to control in subtropical forests.

Phylogenetic diversity correlated with above‐ground biomass production during forest succession: Evidence from tropical forests in Southeast Asia

“…From these results they concluded that abiotic filtering strongly dominated the plant community assembly in the early stages of succession and the role of biotic interactions increased in the later successional stages. However, some studies argue that changes in plant phylogenetic community structure during succession may not be caused only by environmental filtering and biotic interactions (deterministic factors), but can also be caused by stochastic factors (Martins et al, ; Mi et al, ). For example, Norden, Letcher, Boukili, Swenson, and Chazdon, () found that demographic processes (mortality and recruitment) drove variation in phylogenetic community structure across successional gradients at different temporal scales.…”

“…For example, Norden, Letcher, Boukili, Swenson, and Chazdon, () found that demographic processes (mortality and recruitment) drove variation in phylogenetic community structure across successional gradients at different temporal scales. Mi et al, () found weak evidence of deterministic processes (species, functional and phylogenetic turnover) in plant community assembly during forest succession in Southeastern China. They suggested that the weak evidence for deterministic processes detected might result from the prevalence of stochastic processes, particularly priority effects and random immigration.…”

Taxon sampling effects on the quantification and comparison of community phylogenetic diversity

“…() inferred the phylogenetic relationships of all European plants from a tree missing major clades including monocotyledons, legumes and sunflowers, casting serious doubts on their conclusions (Davis, Schaefer, Ruhfel, Donoghue, & Edwards, ). While this issue seems especially prevalent in studies of plant communities (e.g., Barber et al., ; Bhaskar, Porder, Balvanera, & Edwards, ; Condit, Engelbrecht, Pino, Pérez, & Turner, ; Funk & Wolf, ; Godoy et al., ; Kress et al., ; Li et al., ; Lososová et al., ; Marx, Giblin, Dunwiddie, & Tank, ; Matos et al., ; Mi et al., ; Montesinos‐Navarro, Verdú, Querejeta, & Valiente‐Banuet, ; Navarro‐Cano et al., ; Pellissier et al., ; Pistón, Schöb, Armas, Prieto, & Pugnaire, ; Staab et al., ; Xu et al., ), it is present in animal studies as well (e.g., Arnan, Cerdá, & Retana, ). To determine how prevalent this practice is currently, we surveyed the scientific literature of 2017 using the Boolean search term “community AND (phylogenetics OR phylogeny OR tree).” We included studies that used phylogenetic data (as opposed to taxonomic ranks) and excluded reviews, posters, books, conference abstracts or other non‐peer‐reviewed articles.…”

Community Preferences of Woody Plant Species in a Heterogeneous Temperate Forest, China

“…Many studies on the spatial distribution and drivers of woody plants are available. In particular, the effects of abiotic factors, such as topography (Svenning, 1999;Wangda and Ohsawa, 2006;Lan et al, 2011), light (Han et al, 2017;Gallé et al, 2018), and soil (Song et al, 2015;Gao et al, 2017), and biological factors, such as competition (Zhu et al, 2015(Zhu et al, , 2018 and species succession (Mi et al, 2016;Sun et al, 2017), on woody plants have been investigated. In the present study, different woody plant species had distinct specific preferences among various plant community types in the temperate mountain forest.…”