The interplay of facilitation and competition drives the emergence of multistability in dryland plant communities.

Abstract

Within communities, species are wrapped in a set of feedbacks with each other and with their environment. When such feedbacks are strong enough they can generate alternative stable states. So far, research on alternative stable states has mostly focused on systems with a small number of species and a limited diversity of interaction types. Here, we analyze a spatial model of plant community dynamics in stressed ecosystems such as drylands, where each species is characterized by a strategy, and the different species interact through facilitation and competition for space and resources, such as water. We identify three different types of multistability emerging from the interplay of competition and facilitation. Under low-stress levels, plant communities organize in small groups of coexisting species, maintained by space, competition and facilitation ("cliques"). Under higher stress levels, positive feedback from facilitation lead to the dominance of a single facilitating species ("mutual exclusion states"). At the highest stress levels, the single facilitating species left in the system coexists with the desert state. By linking community ecology and alternative stable states theory using a spatial plant community model for stressed ecosystems, our study contributes to highlight the importance of positive feedback loops for the stability of ecological communities.