Weed‐suppressive ability and species dominance in intercropping: A meta‐regression

作者：Chunfeng Gu, Wopke van der Werf, L. Bastiaans · 发表于：Journal of Ecology · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.1111/1365-2745.70090 · 被引用次数：5 · 研究领域：Agronomic Practices and Intercropping Systems、Plant Parasitism and Resistance、Agroforestry and silvopastoral systems

Abstract In intercropping, weed biomass is usually lower than the average of the respective monocultures. Recent studies suggest that enhanced weed suppression in intercrops results from a selection effect, whereby the stronger weed‐suppressive species contributes disproportionately to overall suppression. Next to improving weed suppression, its dominance may also result in the weaker suppressive species being outcompeted. However, this hypothesis remains untested. Here, we analysed data from 47 experiments reporting weed and crop data in annual bi‐specific intercrops and pure stands to test whether species with stronger weed‐suppressive ability outperform their companions in intercrops. Weed biomass in pure stands was used to identify the stronger (s) and weaker (w) weed suppressor. For both species, the ratio of realized to expected yield in the intercrop (i.e. the net effect ratio, NER ) was calculated. The competitive ratio CR sw (= NER s / NER w ) was then calculated to assess whether the stronger weed suppressor outperformed its companion in the intercrop. We assessed species performance and explored how their weed suppressiveness related to dominance in intercrops. We also examined the influence of plant density, spatial arrangement and species combination. The stronger weed suppressors showed a competitive advantage over the weaker ones in intercrops ( CR sw = 1.33), with their dominance becoming more pronounced as the difference in weed‐suppressive abilities between ...