Globally, plant‐soil feedbacks are weak predictors of plant abundance

作者：Kurt O. Reinhart, Jonathan T. Bauer, Sarah McCarthy‐Neumann, Andrew S. MacDougall, José L. Hierro, Mariana C. Chiuffo, Scott A. Mangan, Johannes Heinze, Joana Bergmann, Jasmin Joshi, Richard P. Duncan, Jeff Diez, Paul Kardol, Gemma Rutten, Markus Fischer, Wim H. van der Putten, Т. Martijn Bezemer, John N. Klironomos · 发表于：Ecology and Evolution · 年份：2021 · DOI：10.1002/ece3.7167 · 被引用次数：53 · 研究领域：Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies、Agronomic Practices and Intercropping Systems、Mycorrhizal Fungi and Plant Interactions

Abstract Plant‐soil feedbacks (PSFs) have been shown to strongly affect plant performance under controlled conditions, and PSFs are thought to have far reaching consequences for plant population dynamics and the structuring of plant communities. However, thus far the relationship between PSF and plant species abundance in the field is not consistent. Here, we synthesize PSF experiments from tropical forests to semiarid grasslands, and test for a positive relationship between plant abundance in the field and PSFs estimated from controlled bioassays. We meta‐analyzed results from 22 PSF experiments and found an overall positive correlation (0.12 ≤ ≤ 0.32) between plant abundance in the field and PSFs across plant functional types (herbaceous and woody plants) but also variation by plant functional type. Thus, our analysis provides quantitative support that plant abundance has a general albeit weak positive relationship with PSFs across ecosystems. Overall, our results suggest that harmful soil biota tend to accumulate around and disproportionately impact species that are rare. However, data for the herbaceous species, which are most common in the literature, had no significant abundance‐PSFs relationship. Therefore, we conclude that further work is needed within and across biomes, succession stages and plant types, both under controlled and field conditions, while separating PSF effects from other drivers (e.g., herbivory, competition, disturbance) of plant abundance to tease a...