Variation in habitat suitability does not always relate to variation in species' plant functional traits.

Details

Serval ID
serval:BIB_0C1013082106
Type
Article: article from journal or magazin.
Collection
Publications
Institution
Title
Variation in habitat suitability does not always relate to variation in species' plant functional traits.
Journal
Biology Letters
Author(s)
Thuiller W., Albert C.H., Dubuis A., Randin C., Guisan A.
ISSN
1744-957X (Electronic)
ISSN-L
1744-9561
Publication state
Published
Issued date
2010
Peer-reviewed
Oui
Volume
6
Number
1
Pages
120-123
Language
english
Abstract
Habitat suitability models, which relate species occurrences to environmental variables, are assumed to predict suitable conditions for a given species. If these models are reliable, they should relate to change in plant growth and function. In this paper, we ask the question whether habitat suitability models are able to predict variation in plant functional traits, often assumed to be a good surrogate for a species' overall health and vigour. Using a thorough sampling design, we show a tight link between variation in plant functional traits and habitat suitability for some species, but not for others. Our contrasting results pave the way towards a better understanding of how species cope with varying habitat conditions and demonstrate that habitat suitability models can provide meaningful descriptions of the functional niche in some cases, but not in others.
Keywords
Adaptation, Biological/physiology, Ecosystem, France, Models, Biological, Plant Development, Species Specificity, Switzerland
Pubmed
Web of science
Create date
02/09/2009 6:20
Last modification date
20/08/2019 12:33
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