Abstract
The relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem function has received a great deal of attention in ecological research and recent results, from re-analyses, suggest that ecosystem function improves with increases in phylogenetic diversity. However, many of these results have been generalized across a range of different species and clades, and plants with different evolutionary histories could display different relationships between biodiversity and ecosystem function. To experimentally test this hypothesis, we manipulated species richness and phylogenetic diversity using 26 species from two subgenera of the genus Eucalyptus (subgenus Eucalyptus and subgenus Symphyomyrtus). We found that plant biomass (a measurement of ecosystem function) sometimes, but not always, responded to increases in species richness and phylogenetic diversity. Specifically, Symphyomyrtus plants showed a positive response while no comparable effect was observed for Eucalyptus plants, showing that responses to biodiversity can vary across different phylogenetic groups. Our results show that the impacts of evolutionary history may complicate the relationship between the diversity of plant communities and plant biomass.
Highlights
Biodiversity is fundamental to ecosystem services (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005), and it has been shown that ecosystem function generally improves with increasing species richness (Naeem et al, 1996; Hooper & Vitousek, 1997; Hector et al, 1999; Troumbis et al, 2000; Tilman et al, 2001)
In analyses that classified mixture pots according to species richness (SR), we found that SR and subgenus identity interacted to affect stem diameter, survival, and biomass (Table 1, Fig. 1)
Post-hoc contrasts indicated that the phylogenetic diversity (PD) ∗ subgenus interaction terms for height, stem diameter and biomass were driven by differences in Symphyomyrtus performance between monocultures and within-subgenus mixtures (Table 2)
Summary
Biodiversity is fundamental to ecosystem services (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005), and it has been shown that ecosystem function generally improves with increasing species richness (Naeem et al, 1996; Hooper & Vitousek, 1997; Hector et al, 1999; Troumbis et al, 2000; Tilman et al, 2001). While convergent evolution may give rise to similar traits in lineages that have different evolutionary histories, in general, individuals with different evolutionary histories may respond in different ways to increases in phylogenetic diversity. Because different evolutionary histories give rise to different traits, it is possible that the effects of species richness on ecosystem function will vary across different phylogenetic groups (i.e., clades or other distributions)
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