Plant traits poorly predict winner and loser shrub species in a warming tundra biome

Mariana García Criado*, Isla H. Myers-Smith, Anne D. Bjorkman, Signe Normand, Anne Blach-Overgaard, Haydn J.D. Thomas, Anu Eskelinen, Konsta Happonen, Juha M. Alatalo, Alba Anadon-Rosell, Isabelle Aubin, Mariska te Beest, Katlyn R. Betway-May, Daan Blok, Allan Buras, Bruno E.L. Cerabolini, Katherine Christie, J. Hans C. Cornelissen, Bruce C. Forbes, Esther R. FreiPaul Grogan, Luise Hermanutz, Robert D. Hollister, James Hudson, Maitane Iturrate-Garcia, Elina Kaarlejärvi, Michael Kleyer, Laurent J. Lamarque, Jonas J. Lembrechts, Esther Lévesque, Miska Luoto, Petr Macek, Jeremy L. May, Janet S. Prevéy, Gabriela Schaepman-Strub, Serge N. Sheremetiev, Laura Siegwart Collier, Nadejda A. Soudzilovskaia, Andrew Trant, Susanna E. Venn, Anna Maria Virkkala

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to JournalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Climate change is leading to species redistributions. In the tundra biome, shrubs are generally expanding, but not all tundra shrub species will benefit from warming. Winner and loser species, and the characteristics that may determine success or failure, have not yet been fully identified. Here, we investigate whether past abundance changes, current range sizes and projected range shifts derived from species distribution models are related to plant trait values and intraspecific trait variation. We combined 17,921 trait records with observed past and modelled future distributions from 62 tundra shrub species across three continents. We found that species with greater variation in seed mass and specific leaf area had larger projected range shifts, and projected winner species had greater seed mass values. However, trait values and variation were not consistently related to current and projected ranges, nor to past abundance change. Overall, our findings indicate that abundance change and range shifts will not lead to directional modifications in shrub trait composition, since winner and loser species share relatively similar trait spaces.

Original languageEnglish
Article number3837
Pages (from-to)1-17
Number of pages17
JournalNature Communications
Volume14
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 28 Jun 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
We thank Alberto S. Ballesteros for fixing picture issues and designing the shrub, leaf, and seed icons. We thank all tundra data collectors and supporting organisations, including members of the International Tundra Experiment Network (ITEX) for their efforts in data collection and for making their data accessible. We are grateful to all trait data collectors who made their data available through the TRY and TTT databases. We thank local and Indigenous peoples for the opportunity to work with data collected on their lands. M.G.C. was supported by the Principal’s Career Development PhD Scholarship from The University of Edinburgh, the Elizabeth Sinclair Irvine Bequest and Centenary Agroforestry 89 Fund, and the BritishSpanish Society Award. I.H.M.-S. was supported by the NERC Shrub Tundra grant (NE/M016323/1). A.D.B. was supported by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation (Wallenberg Academy Fellowship 2019). A.B.-O. was supported by VILLUM FONDEN’s Young Investigator Programme (VKR023456 to S.N.), and The Danish Council for Independent Research: Natural Sciences (DFF 4181-00565 to S.N.). B.C.F. was supported by Academy of Finland decision no. 256991, European Commission Research and Innovation Action no. 869471, and JPI-Climate no. 291581. G.S.-S. was supported by the University Research Priority Program on Global Change and Biodiversity of the University of Zurich. A.B. acknowledges the funding received from INTERACT (grant agreement no. 262693), under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme. L.H., L.S.C., E.L., and A.T. acknowledge funding from NSERC-NCE ArcticNet. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

Funding Information:
We thank Alberto S. Ballesteros for fixing picture issues and designing the shrub, leaf, and seed icons. We thank all tundra data collectors and supporting organisations, including members of the International Tundra Experiment Network (ITEX) for their efforts in data collection and for making their data accessible. We are grateful to all trait data collectors who made their data available through the TRY and TTT databases. We thank local and Indigenous peoples for the opportunity to work with data collected on their lands. M.G.C. was supported by the Principal’s Career Development PhD Scholarship from The University of Edinburgh, the Elizabeth Sinclair Irvine Bequest and Centenary Agroforestry 89 Fund, and the BritishSpanish Society Award. I.H.M.-S. was supported by the NERC Shrub Tundra grant (NE/M016323/1). A.D.B. was supported by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation (Wallenberg Academy Fellowship 2019). A.B.-O. was supported by VILLUM FONDEN’s Young Investigator Programme (VKR023456 to S.N.), and The Danish Council for Independent Research: Natural Sciences (DFF 4181-00565 to S.N.). B.C.F. was supported by Academy of Finland decision no. 256991, European Commission Research and Innovation Action no. 869471, and JPI-Climate no. 291581. G.S.-S. was supported by the University Research Priority Program on Global Change and Biodiversity of the University of Zurich. A.B. acknowledges the funding received from INTERACT (grant agreement no. 262693), under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme. L.H., L.S.C., E.L., and A.T. acknowledge funding from NSERC-NCE ArcticNet. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s).

Funding

We thank Alberto S. Ballesteros for fixing picture issues and designing the shrub, leaf, and seed icons. We thank all tundra data collectors and supporting organisations, including members of the International Tundra Experiment Network (ITEX) for their efforts in data collection and for making their data accessible. We are grateful to all trait data collectors who made their data available through the TRY and TTT databases. We thank local and Indigenous peoples for the opportunity to work with data collected on their lands. M.G.C. was supported by the Principal’s Career Development PhD Scholarship from The University of Edinburgh, the Elizabeth Sinclair Irvine Bequest and Centenary Agroforestry 89 Fund, and the BritishSpanish Society Award. I.H.M.-S. was supported by the NERC Shrub Tundra grant (NE/M016323/1). A.D.B. was supported by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation (Wallenberg Academy Fellowship 2019). A.B.-O. was supported by VILLUM FONDEN’s Young Investigator Programme (VKR023456 to S.N.), and The Danish Council for Independent Research: Natural Sciences (DFF 4181-00565 to S.N.). B.C.F. was supported by Academy of Finland decision no. 256991, European Commission Research and Innovation Action no. 869471, and JPI-Climate no. 291581. G.S.-S. was supported by the University Research Priority Program on Global Change and Biodiversity of the University of Zurich. A.B. acknowledges the funding received from INTERACT (grant agreement no. 262693), under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme. L.H., L.S.C., E.L., and A.T. acknowledge funding from NSERC-NCE ArcticNet. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government. We thank Alberto S. Ballesteros for fixing picture issues and designing the shrub, leaf, and seed icons. We thank all tundra data collectors and supporting organisations, including members of the International Tundra Experiment Network (ITEX) for their efforts in data collection and for making their data accessible. We are grateful to all trait data collectors who made their data available through the TRY and TTT databases. We thank local and Indigenous peoples for the opportunity to work with data collected on their lands. M.G.C. was supported by the Principal’s Career Development PhD Scholarship from The University of Edinburgh, the Elizabeth Sinclair Irvine Bequest and Centenary Agroforestry 89 Fund, and the BritishSpanish Society Award. I.H.M.-S. was supported by the NERC Shrub Tundra grant (NE/M016323/1). A.D.B. was supported by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation (Wallenberg Academy Fellowship 2019). A.B.-O. was supported by VILLUM FONDEN’s Young Investigator Programme (VKR023456 to S.N.), and The Danish Council for Independent Research: Natural Sciences (DFF 4181-00565 to S.N.). B.C.F. was supported by Academy of Finland decision no. 256991, European Commission Research and Innovation Action no. 869471, and JPI-Climate no. 291581. G.S.-S. was supported by the University Research Priority Program on Global Change and Biodiversity of the University of Zurich. A.B. acknowledges the funding received from INTERACT (grant agreement no. 262693), under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme. L.H., L.S.C., E.L., and A.T. acknowledge funding from NSERC-NCE ArcticNet. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

FundersFunder number
Elizabeth Sinclair Irvine Bequest and Centenary Agroforestry 89 Fund
European Commission Research and Innovation Action869471, 291581
INTERACT262693
NSERC-NCE ArcticNet
U.S. Government
Natur og Univers, Det Frie ForskningsrådDFF 4181-00565
Natur og Univers, Det Frie Forskningsråd
Villum FondenVKR023456
Villum Fonden
Seventh Framework Programme
Natural Environment Research CouncilNE/M016323/1
Natural Environment Research Council
University of Edinburgh
Academy of Finland256991
Academy of Finland
Knut och Alice Wallenbergs Stiftelse
Universität Zürich

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