The DOI matches its Crossref record; 38 of the 38 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
How do traits vary across ecological scales? A case for trait‐based ecology
Abstract
Ecology Letters (2010) 13: 838–848 Despite the increasing importance of functional traits for the study of plant ecology, we do not know how variation in a given trait changes across ecological scales, which prevents us from assessing potential scale‐dependent aspects of trait variation. To address this deficiency, we partitioned the variance in two key functional traits (leaf mass area and leaf dry matter content) across six nested ecological scales (site, plot, species, tree, strata and leaf) in lowland tropical rainforests. In both traits, the plot level shows virtually no variance despite high species turnover among plots and the size of within‐species variation (leaf + strata + tree) is comparable with that of species level variation. The lack of variance at the plot level brings substantial support to the idea that trait‐based environmental filtering plays a central role in plant community assembly. These results and the finding that the amount of within‐species variation is comparable with interspecific variation support a shift of focus from species‐based to trait‐based ecology.
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Let the concept of trait be functional!
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Self-citationA handbook of protocols for standardised and easy measurement of plant functional traits worldwide
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Plant Ecological Strategies: Some Leading Dimensions of Variation Between Species
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The Ecology of Individuals: Incidence and Implications of Individual Specialization
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Self-citationBeyond species: functional diversity and the maintenance of ecological processes and services
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Self-citationThe return of the variance: intraspecific variability in community ecology
Violle, C., Enquist, B. J., McGill, B. J., Jiang, L., Albert, C. H., Hulshof, C., Jung, V., & Messier, J. (2012) · Trends in Ecology & Evolution · doi:10.1016/j.tree.2011.11.014 · Cited by 1,768
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Metadata
- Authors
- Messier, J., McGill, B. J., & Lechowicz, M. J.
- Venue
- Ecology Letters
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2010-06-14
- Volume
- 13
- Issue
- 7
- Pages
- 838-848
- ISSN
- 1461-023X (ISSN-L)
- 1461-0248
- OpenAlex
- W2121119057
- Cited by
- 830
- References
- 38
- FWCI
- 25.42
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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