Plant traits poorly predict winner and loser shrub species in a warming tundra biome.

Climate change is leading to species redistributions. In the tundra biome, shrubs are generally expanding, but not all tundra shrub species will benefit from warming. Winner and loser species, and the characteristics that may determine success or failure, have not yet been fully identified.

People and Plants in Nunatsiavut (Labrador, Canada): Examining Plants as a Foundational Aspect of Culture in the Subarctic.

Unlabelled: This paper emphasizes the cultural value of plants in Nunatsiavut (Labrador, Canada), a self-governing Inuit region in the Subarctic. Via interviews with community members, we describe the links between plant usage and culture to understand the direct ways that plants are utilized for food, construction, gardening, and medicine, and to then link these uses to deeper cultural significance among three communities in Nunatsiavut (Hopedale, Postville, and Rigolet). Many plants were common amongst communities with a total of 66 taxa identified.

Global plant trait relationships extend to the climatic extremes of the tundra biome.

The majority of variation in six traits critical to the growth, survival and reproduction of plant species is thought to be organised along just two dimensions, corresponding to strategies of plant size and resource acquisition. However, it is unknown whether global plant trait relationships extend to climatic extremes, and if these interspecific relationships are confounded by trait variation within species. We test whether trait relationships extend to the cold extremes of life on Earth using the largest database of tundra plant traits yet compiled.

Traditional plant functional groups explain variation in economic but not size-related traits across the tundra biome.

Aim: Plant functional groups are widely used in community ecology and earth system modelling to describe trait variation within and across plant communities. However, this approach rests on the assumption that functional groups explain a large proportion of trait variation among species. We test whether four commonly used plant functional groups represent variation in six ecologically important plant traits.

Plant functional trait change across a warming tundra biome.

The tundra is warming more rapidly than any other biome on Earth, and the potential ramifications are far-reaching because of global feedback effects between vegetation and climate. A better understanding of how environmental factors shape plant structure and function is crucial for predicting the consequences of environmental change for ecosystem functioning. Here we explore the biome-wide relationships between temperature, moisture and seven key plant functional traits both across space and over three decades of warming at 117 tundra locations.

BioTIME: A database of biodiversity time series for the Anthropocene.

Motivation: The BioTIME database contains raw data on species identities and abundances in ecological assemblages through time. These data enable users to calculate temporal trends in biodiversity within and amongst assemblages using a broad range of metrics. BioTIME is being developed as a community-led open-source database of biodiversity time series.

Experiment, monitoring, and gradient methods used to infer climate change effects on plant communities yield consistent patterns.

Inference about future climate change impacts typically relies on one of three approaches: manipulative experiments, historical comparisons (broadly defined to include monitoring the response to ambient climate fluctuations using repeat sampling of plots, dendroecology, and paleoecology techniques), and space-for-time substitutions derived from sampling along environmental gradients. Potential limitations of all three approaches are recognized. Here we address the congruence among these three main approaches by comparing the degree to which tundra plant community composition changes (i) in response to in situ experimental warming, (ii) with interannual variability in summer temperature within sites, and (iii) over spatial gradients in summer temperature.

Evaluating human-disturbed habitats for recovery planning of endangered plants.

The recovery potential of endangered species is limited by the high prevalence of human-modified habitats, while effective in situ conservation strategies to identify and restore disturbed habitat within species ranges are lacking. Our goal was to determine the impact of human disturbance on the endangered endemic Barrens willow (Salix jejuna) to provide science-based protocols for future restoration of disturbed habitats; a key component of conservation and recovery plans for many rare plant species. Our study examined differences in substrate (e.

Global assessment of experimental climate warming on tundra vegetation: heterogeneity over space and time.

Understanding the sensitivity of tundra vegetation to climate warming is critical to forecasting future biodiversity and vegetation feedbacks to climate. In situ warming experiments accelerate climate change on a small scale to forecast responses of local plant communities. Limitations of this approach include the apparent site-specificity of results and uncertainty about the power of short-term studies to anticipate longer term change.

Generation of priority research questions to inform conservation policy and management at a national level.

Integrating knowledge from across the natural and social sciences is necessary to effectively address societal tradeoffs between human use of biological diversity and its preservation. Collaborative processes can change the ways decision makers think about scientific evidence, enhance levels of mutual trust and credibility, and advance the conservation policy discourse. Canada has responsibility for a large fraction of some major ecosystems, such as boreal forests, Arctic tundra, wetlands, and temperate and Arctic oceans.

Are boreal ecosystems susceptible to alien plant invasion? Evidence from protected areas.

Although biological invasion by alien species is a major contributor to loss of indigenous biological diversity, few studies have examined the susceptibility of the boreal biome to invasion. Based on studies of other ecosystems, we hypothesized that alien plants will be restricted to disturbed areas near human activity and will not be found in natural areas of boreal ecosystems in Gros Morne National Park (Canada), a protected area experiencing a wide range of disturbance regimes. The distribution of alien plants in the region was evaluated using surveys, and study sites were established in naturally and anthropogenically disturbed habitats that had been invaded.

Agroecotypes or phenotypic plasticity? comparison of agrestal and ruderal populations of the weed Solanum ptycanthum.

To test if the high nutrient inputs of agroeosystems select for specialized agroecotypes or for phenotypic plasticity, Ontario populations of the northwardly migrating annual weed Solanum ptycanthum from ruderal (beach) and agricultural habitats were compared over a nutrient gradient. Temporal variation of total available nitrogen was determined in both types of habitats. As gene flow via seed contamination of tomato transplants from S.

The pollination biology and breeding system of Monarda fistulosa (Labiatae).

Successful cross-pollination of Monarda fistulosa is the result of a complex interaction among flower opening, the pollen-bearing areas of the pollinators and/or their behavior, and the maturation of the stigmas. The flowers open continuously from 0800-2000 h providing a temporally predictable rich source of nectar and pollen. Recently opened flowers may reduce the ability of bees to discriminate between resource rich and poor patches and encourage systematic foraging within patches.