Species performance: The relationship between nutrient availability, life history traits and stress [Chapter 8]

Abstract

Differences in species performance (i.e. how a species captures and utilizes resources to maintain and increase population size), influences the rate and direction of plant community change (Sheley et al., 2006). Species performance is determined by a number of interacting factors. This includes resource supply rates, physiological traits that determine how a species affects and responds to the environment, life history traits that determine patterns of birth, mortality and growth of individuals in a population, as well as abiotic and biotic stressors such as herbivory or drought. Researchers and land managers long have recognized that our ability to predict and manage the spread of invasive species directly depends on our understanding of the processes that differentially impacts the performance of invasive and native plants. In nutrient poor systems across the globe, increases in nutrient availability increases the susceptible of ecosystems to invasion (Mack et al., 2000). This general and widespread response indicates that increases in nutrient availability are likely favoring the performance of invasive species over native species.

Citation

James, Jeremy J. 2012. Species performance: The relationship between nutrient availability, life history traits and stress [Chapter 8]. In: Monaco, T. M.; Sheley, R. L., eds. Invasive plant ecology and management: Linking processes to practice. Oxfordshire, UK: CABI Publishing. p. 142-153.