Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Ecology
Publisher
The Ecological Society of America
Publication Date
7-2014
Volume
95
Issue
7
Disciplines
Biology | Ecology and Evolutionary Biology | Life Sciences
Abstract
Interactions between plants can have strong effects on community structure and function. Variability in the morphological, developmental, physiological, and biochemical traits of plants can influence the outcome of plant interactions and thus have important ecological consequences. However, the ecological ramifications of trait variability in plants are poorly understood and have rarely been tested in the field. We experimentally tested the effects of morphological variation in root architecture of Quercus douglasii trees in the field on interactions between understory plants and community composition. Our results indicate that variability among Q. douglasii tree root systems initiates a striking reversal in the competitive effects of dominant understory grass species on a less common species. Trees with a deeprooted morphology facilitated exotic annual grasses and these annual grasses, in turn, competitively excluded the native perennial bunchgrass, Stipa pulchra. In contrast, Q. douglasii trees with shallow-rooted morphologies directly suppressed the growth of exotic annual grasses and indirectly released S. pulchra individuals from competition with these annual grasses. Morphological variation in the root architecture of Q. douglasii created substantial conditionality in the outcomes of competition among species which enhanced the potential for indirect interactions to sustain coexistence and increase community diversity.
Keywords
blue oak, community assembly, competition, facilitation, Quercus douglasii, Stipa pulchra, trait-mediated indirect interactions
DOI
10.1890/13-1749.1
Rights
© 2014 by the Ecological Society of America
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Erik T. Aschehoug and Ragan M. Callaway 2014. Morphological variability in tree root architecture indirectly affects coexistence among competitors in the understory. Ecology 95:1731–1736. http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/13-1749.1