TY - JOUR
T1 - Globally, plant-soil feedbacks are weak predictors of plant abundance
AU - Reinhart, Kurt O.
AU - Bauer, Jonathan T.
AU - McCarthy-Neumann, Sarah
AU - MacDougall, Andrew S.
AU - Hierro, José L.
AU - Chiuffo, Mariana C.
AU - Mangan, Scott A.
AU - Heinze, Johannes
AU - Bergmann, Joana
AU - Joshi, Jasmin
AU - Duncan, Richard P.
AU - Diez, Jeff M.
AU - Kardol, Paul
AU - Rutten, Gemma
AU - Fischer, Markus
AU - van der Putten, Wim H.
AU - Bezemer, Thiemo Martijn
AU - Klironomos, John
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank L. Vermeire and E. Espeland for comments on the first draft of our manuscript. This work was funded by USDA appropriated funds (CRIS # 5434‐21630‐003‐00D). Mention of trade names or commercial products in this publication is solely for the purpose of providing specific information and does not imply recommendation or endorsement by the US Department of Agriculture.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd This article has been contributed to by US Government employees and their work is in the public domain in the USA.
PY - 2021/2
Y1 - 2021/2
N2 - Plant-soil feedbacks (PSFs) have been shown to strongly affect plant performance under controlled conditions, and PSFs are thought to have far reaching consequences for plant population dynamics and the structuring of plant communities. However, thus far the relationship between PSF and plant species abundance in the field is not consistent. Here, we synthesize PSF experiments from tropical forests to semiarid grasslands, and test for a positive relationship between plant abundance in the field and PSFs estimated from controlled bioassays. We meta-analyzed results from 22 PSF experiments and found an overall positive correlation (0.12 ≤ (Formula presented.) ≤ 0.32) between plant abundance in the field and PSFs across plant functional types (herbaceous and woody plants) but also variation by plant functional type. Thus, our analysis provides quantitative support that plant abundance has a general albeit weak positive relationship with PSFs across ecosystems. Overall, our results suggest that harmful soil biota tend to accumulate around and disproportionately impact species that are rare. However, data for the herbaceous species, which are most common in the literature, had no significant abundance-PSFs relationship. Therefore, we conclude that further work is needed within and across biomes, succession stages and plant types, both under controlled and field conditions, while separating PSF effects from other drivers (e.g., herbivory, competition, disturbance) of plant abundance to tease apart the role of soil biota in causing patterns of plant rarity versus commonness.
AB - Plant-soil feedbacks (PSFs) have been shown to strongly affect plant performance under controlled conditions, and PSFs are thought to have far reaching consequences for plant population dynamics and the structuring of plant communities. However, thus far the relationship between PSF and plant species abundance in the field is not consistent. Here, we synthesize PSF experiments from tropical forests to semiarid grasslands, and test for a positive relationship between plant abundance in the field and PSFs estimated from controlled bioassays. We meta-analyzed results from 22 PSF experiments and found an overall positive correlation (0.12 ≤ (Formula presented.) ≤ 0.32) between plant abundance in the field and PSFs across plant functional types (herbaceous and woody plants) but also variation by plant functional type. Thus, our analysis provides quantitative support that plant abundance has a general albeit weak positive relationship with PSFs across ecosystems. Overall, our results suggest that harmful soil biota tend to accumulate around and disproportionately impact species that are rare. However, data for the herbaceous species, which are most common in the literature, had no significant abundance-PSFs relationship. Therefore, we conclude that further work is needed within and across biomes, succession stages and plant types, both under controlled and field conditions, while separating PSF effects from other drivers (e.g., herbivory, competition, disturbance) of plant abundance to tease apart the role of soil biota in causing patterns of plant rarity versus commonness.
KW - community composition
KW - meta-analysis
KW - plant abundance
KW - plant dominance
KW - plant rarity
KW - plant-soil feedbacks
KW - soil biota
KW - species coexistence
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85099965405&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1002/ece3.7167
DO - 10.1002/ece3.7167
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85099965405
SN - 2045-7758
VL - 11
SP - 1756
EP - 1768
JO - Ecology and Evolution
JF - Ecology and Evolution
IS - 4
ER -