@article{e2dc31bbe19046f7b8a627c1e074e541,
title = "Plant community impact on productivity: Trait diversity or key(stone) species effects?",
abstract = "Outside controlled experimental plots, the impact of community attributes on primary productivity has rarely been compared to that of individual species. Here, we identified plant species of high importance for productivity (key species) in >29,000 diverse grassland communities in the European Alps, and compared their effects with those of community-level measures of functional composition (weighted means, variances, skewness and kurtosis). After accounting for the environment, the five most important key species jointly explained more deviance of productivity than any measure of functional composition alone. Key species were generally tall with high specific leaf areas. By dividing the observations according to distinct habitats, the explanatory power of key species and functional composition increased and key-species plant types and functional composition-productivity relationships varied systematically, presumably because of changing interactions and trade-offs between traits. Our results advocate for a careful consideration of species{\textquoteright} individual effects on ecosystem functioning in complement to community-level measures.",
keywords = "European Alps, community-weighted moments, grassland, keystone species, trait driver theory",
author = "Philipp Brun and Cyrille Violle and David Mouillot and Nicolas Mouquet and Enquist, {Brian J.} and Fran{\c c}ois Munoz and Tamara M{\"u}nkem{\"u}ller and Annette Ostling and Zimmermann, {Niklaus E.} and Wilfried Thuiller",
note = "Funding Information: This research was supported by the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB; www.fondationbiodiversite.fr ) and EDF in the context of the CESAB project {\textquoteleft}Causes and consequences of functional rarity from local to global scales{\textquoteright} (FREE) and by the ANR‐SNF bilateral project OriginAlps, with grant numbers 310030L_170059 (P.B., N.E.Z & WT) and two {\textquoteleft}Investissement d{\textquoteright}Avenir{\textquoteright} grants (Montane: ANR‐15‐IDEX‐ 02 & ANR‐10‐LAB‐56) (W.T. & T.M.). We further acknowledge the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) grant numbers 1003A_149508 (N.E.Z.). Moreover, we thank Maya Gueguen for downscaling annual mean temperature to 100 m resolution. Finally, this study was supported by the TRY initiative that is maintained by the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena, Germany, and currently supported by DIVERSITAS/Future Earth and the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle‐Jena‐Leipzig. Open access funding provided by ETH‐Bereich Forschungsanstalten. Funding Information: This research was supported by the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB; www.fondationbiodiversite.fr) and EDF in the context of the CESAB project {\textquoteleft}Causes and consequences of functional rarity from local to global scales{\textquoteright} (FREE) and by the ANR-SNF bilateral project OriginAlps, with grant numbers 310030L_170059 (P.B., N.E.Z & WT) and two {\textquoteleft}Investissement d{\textquoteright}Avenir{\textquoteright} grants (Montane: ANR-15-IDEX- 02 & ANR-10-LAB-56) (W.T. & T.M.). We further acknowledge the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) grant numbers 1003A_149508 (N.E.Z.). Moreover, we thank Maya Gueguen for downscaling annual mean temperature to 100 m resolution. Finally, this study was supported by the TRY initiative that is maintained by the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena, Germany, and currently supported by DIVERSITAS/Future Earth and the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig. Open access funding provided by ETH-Bereich Forschungsanstalten. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022 The Authors. Ecology Letters published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.",
year = "2022",
month = apr,
doi = "10.1111/ele.13968",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "25",
pages = "913--925",
journal = "Ecology Letters",
issn = "1461-023X",
publisher = "Wiley-Blackwell",
number = "4",
}