TY - JOUR

T1 - Neighbourhood interactions drive overyielding in mixed-species tree communities

AU - Fichtner, Andreas

AU - Härdtle, Werner

AU - Bruehlheide, Helge

AU - Kunz, Matthias

AU - Li, Ying

AU - von Oheimb, Goddert

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2018 The Author(s).

PY - 2018/12/1

Y1 - 2018/12/1

N2 - Theory suggests that plant interactions at the neighbourhood scale play a fundamental role in regulating biodiversity-productivity relationships (BPRs) in tree communities. However, empirical evidence of this prediction is rare, as little is known about how neighbourhood interactions scale up to influence community BPRs. Here, using a biodiversity-ecosystem functioning experiment, we provide insights into processes underlying BPRs by demonstrating that diversity-mediated interactions among local neighbours are a strong regulator of productivity in species mixtures. Our results show that local neighbourhood interactions explain over half of the variation in observed community productivity along a diversity gradient. Overall, individual tree growth increased with neighbourhood species richness, leading to a positive BPR at the community scale. The importance of local-scale neighbourhood effects for regulating community productivity, however, distinctly increased with increasing community species richness. Preserving tree species diversity at the local neighbourhood scale, thus seems to be a promising way for promoting forest productivity.

AB - Theory suggests that plant interactions at the neighbourhood scale play a fundamental role in regulating biodiversity-productivity relationships (BPRs) in tree communities. However, empirical evidence of this prediction is rare, as little is known about how neighbourhood interactions scale up to influence community BPRs. Here, using a biodiversity-ecosystem functioning experiment, we provide insights into processes underlying BPRs by demonstrating that diversity-mediated interactions among local neighbours are a strong regulator of productivity in species mixtures. Our results show that local neighbourhood interactions explain over half of the variation in observed community productivity along a diversity gradient. Overall, individual tree growth increased with neighbourhood species richness, leading to a positive BPR at the community scale. The importance of local-scale neighbourhood effects for regulating community productivity, however, distinctly increased with increasing community species richness. Preserving tree species diversity at the local neighbourhood scale, thus seems to be a promising way for promoting forest productivity.

KW - Ecosystems Research

KW - plant interactions

KW - neighbourhood interactions

KW - Biodiversity

KW - Biodiversity

KW - Community ecology

KW - Forest ecology

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85044440478&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/1599e574-8193-3200-b69a-dd13dc9d4e32/

U2 - 10.1038/s41467-018-03529-w

DO - 10.1038/s41467-018-03529-w

M3 - Journal articles

C2 - 29559628

VL - 9

JO - Nature Communications

JF - Nature Communications

SN - 2041-1723

IS - 1

M1 - 1144

ER -