Functional and phylogenetic dissimilarity of woody plants drive insect herbivory in highly diverse forests
The degree of herbivore damage a plant species experiences has been shown to often be affected by the density of conspecific plant neighbors. However, host spectra of many herbivores often comprise a suite of related plant species, and generalist herbivores may even use host plants from a variety of different families. Herbivory might thus be strongly linked to the phylogenetic structure of a plant community, and several patterns would be possible: (1) If host plant use and the plant traits that attract herbivores are phylogenetically conserved, the herbivore damage experienced by a plant species might be the higher the more closely related it is to the remaining species in the community. (2) While this would primarily apply to a scenario with more specialized herbivores, generalist herbivores could also cause higher damage on more distantly related plants if this allows them to avoid high levels of phylogenetically conserved plant defenses in their diet. (3) Phylogenetic effects will ultimately be due to evolutionarily conserved functional traits. However, if the traits that determine host use and herbivore damage are phylogenetically labile, phylogeny would be a weak predictor of herbivore damage. Here, we propose to analyze herbivory patterns of selected tree and shrub species in the CSPs, and relate intraspecific variation in herbivore damage across the 27 study plots to phylogenetic community structure. As the traits determining variation in herbivory need not necessarily show a phylogenetic signal, we also include direct measures of plant functional diversity (based on leaf palatability and defense traits that are relevant for herbivores). This allows us to test whether measures of phylogenetic diversity can complement (or outperform) direct measures of plant functional traits in explaining herbivory patterns across the CSPs, and the results can help to better understand the mechanisms underlying plant diversity-dependent patterns in herbivore damage. We plan to study both community level relationships between herbivory and overall phylogenetic/functional diversity and species-specific herbivory patterns in relation to the mean phylogenetic distance between the respective focal species and all other woody plant species in the forest stands.
2013-01-19 10:40:21 UTC
accept
SP08e Diversity and functional effects of herbivores, predators and saproxylics in a phytodiverse subtropical forest ecosystem
Andreas Schuldt
andreas.schuldt@forst.uni-goettingen.de
Stefan Michalski
stefan.michalski@ufz.de
Thorsten Assmann
assmann@uni.leuphana.de
Walter Durka
walter.durka@ufz.de
Helge Bruelheide, Prof.
helge.bruelheide@botanik.uni-halle.de
Oliver Purschke
oliver.purschke@idiv.de
CSPs: Comparative study plot (CSP) information to be shared with all BEF-China scientists
main
false
Helge Bruelheide, Prof.
helge.bruelheide@botanik.uni-halle.de
Karin Nadrowski
nadrowski@uni-leipzig.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/205/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/205/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
CSPs: Herbivore damage on saplings of 23 tree and shrub species in the CSPs
main
false
Thorsten Assmann
assmann@uni.leuphana.de
Andreas Schuldt
andreas.schuldt@forst.uni-goettingen.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/147/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/147/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
CSPs: Tree and shrub functional diversity, dissimilarity and eveness in the CSPs
main
false
Martin Böhnke
martin.boehnke@botanik.uni-halle.de
David Eichenberg, Dr.
david.eichenberg@uni-leipzig.de
Helge Bruelheide, Prof.
helge.bruelheide@botanik.uni-halle.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/119/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/119/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
CSPs: Tree functional leaf trait diversity in the CSPs
main
false
Helge Bruelheide, Prof.
helge.bruelheide@botanik.uni-halle.de
Wenzel Kröber
noreply@uni.halle.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/211/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/211/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
CSPs: Phylogenetic tree of woody species in the Gutianshan National Reserve
main
false
Stefan Michalski
stefan.michalski@ufz.de
Walter Durka
walter.durka@ufz.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/240/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/240/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
CSPs: Phylogenetic alpha diversity of the comparative study plots
main
false
Stefan Michalski
stefan.michalski@ufz.de
Oliver Purschke
oliver.purschke@idiv.de
Walter Durka
walter.durka@ufz.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/225/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/225/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
CSPs: Leaf traits and chemicals from 132 tree species in the CSPs
main
false
Wenzel Kröber
noreply@uni.halle.de
David Eichenberg, Dr.
david.eichenberg@uni-leipzig.de
Helge Bruelheide, Prof.
helge.bruelheide@botanik.uni-halle.de
Martin Böhnke
martin.boehnke@botanik.uni-halle.de
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/242/download
https://data.bef-china.de/bef-china/datasets/242/download.csv?separate_category_columns=true
New Phytologist
2013-09-19
accepted