TY - JOUR
T1 - Dominance and rarity in tree communities across the globe
T2 - patterns, predictors and threats
AU - Hordijk, Iris
AU - Bialic-Murphy, Lalasia
AU - Lauber, Thomas
AU - Routh, Devin
AU - Poorter, Lourens
AU - Rivers, Malin C.
AU - ter Steege, Hans
AU - Liang, Jingjing
AU - Reich, Peter B.
AU - de-Miguel, Sergio
AU - Nabuurs, Gert Jan
AU - Gamarra, Javier G.P.
AU - Chen, Han Y.H.
AU - Zhou, Mo
AU - Wiser, Susan K.
AU - Pretzsch, Hans
AU - Paquette, Alain
AU - Picard, Nicolas
AU - Hérault, Bruno
AU - Bastin, Jean Francois
AU - Alberti, Giorgio
AU - Abegg, Meinrad
AU - Adou Yao, Yves C.
AU - Almeyda Zambrano, Angelica M.
AU - Alvarado, Braulio V.
AU - Alvarez-Davila, Esteban
AU - Alvarez-Loayza, Patricia
AU - Alves, Luciana F.
AU - Ammer, Christian
AU - Antón-Fernández, Clara
AU - Araujo-Murakami, Alejandro
AU - Arroyo, Luzmila
AU - Avitabile, Valerio
AU - Aymard Corredor, Gerardo A.
AU - Baker, Timothy
AU - Banki, Olaf
AU - Barroso, Jorcely
AU - Bastian, Meredith L.
AU - Birigazzi, Luca
AU - Birnbaum, Philippe
AU - Bitariho, Robert
AU - Boeckx, Pascal
AU - Bongers, Frans
AU - Bouriaud, Olivier
AU - Brancalion, Pedro H.S.
AU - Brandl, Susanne
AU - Brienen, Roel
AU - Broadbent, Eben N.
AU - Pfautsch, Sebastian
AU - Zhu, Zhi Xin
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Author(s). Global Ecology and Biogeography published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
PY - 2024/10
Y1 - 2024/10
N2 - Aim: Ecological and anthropogenic factors shift the abundances of dominant and rare tree species within local forest communities, thus affecting species composition and ecosystem functioning. To inform forest and conservation management it is important to understand the drivers of dominance and rarity in local tree communities. We answer the following research questions: (1) What are the patterns of dominance and rarity in tree communities? (2) Which ecological and anthropogenic factors predict these patterns? And (3) what is the extinction risk of locally dominant and rare tree species?. Location: Global. Time period: 1990–2017. Major taxa studied: Trees. Methods: We used 1.2 million forest plots and quantified local tree dominance as the relative plot basal area of the single most dominant species and local rarity as the percentage of species that contribute together to the least 10% of plot basal area. We mapped global community dominance and rarity using machine learning models and evaluated the ecological and anthropogenic predictors with linear models. Extinction risk, for example threatened status, of geographically widespread dominant and rare species was evaluated. Results: Community dominance and rarity show contrasting latitudinal trends, with boreal forests having high levels of dominance and tropical forests having high levels of rarity. Increasing annual precipitation reduces community dominance, probably because precipitation is related to an increase in tree density and richness. Additionally, stand age is positively related to community dominance, due to stem diameter increase of the most dominant species. Surprisingly, we find that locally dominant and rare species, which are geographically widespread in our data, have an equally high rate of elevated extinction due to declining populations through large-scale land degradation. Main conclusions: By linking patterns and predictors of community dominance and rarity to extinction risk, our results suggest that also widespread species should be considered in large-scale management and conservation practices.
AB - Aim: Ecological and anthropogenic factors shift the abundances of dominant and rare tree species within local forest communities, thus affecting species composition and ecosystem functioning. To inform forest and conservation management it is important to understand the drivers of dominance and rarity in local tree communities. We answer the following research questions: (1) What are the patterns of dominance and rarity in tree communities? (2) Which ecological and anthropogenic factors predict these patterns? And (3) what is the extinction risk of locally dominant and rare tree species?. Location: Global. Time period: 1990–2017. Major taxa studied: Trees. Methods: We used 1.2 million forest plots and quantified local tree dominance as the relative plot basal area of the single most dominant species and local rarity as the percentage of species that contribute together to the least 10% of plot basal area. We mapped global community dominance and rarity using machine learning models and evaluated the ecological and anthropogenic predictors with linear models. Extinction risk, for example threatened status, of geographically widespread dominant and rare species was evaluated. Results: Community dominance and rarity show contrasting latitudinal trends, with boreal forests having high levels of dominance and tropical forests having high levels of rarity. Increasing annual precipitation reduces community dominance, probably because precipitation is related to an increase in tree density and richness. Additionally, stand age is positively related to community dominance, due to stem diameter increase of the most dominant species. Surprisingly, we find that locally dominant and rare species, which are geographically widespread in our data, have an equally high rate of elevated extinction due to declining populations through large-scale land degradation. Main conclusions: By linking patterns and predictors of community dominance and rarity to extinction risk, our results suggest that also widespread species should be considered in large-scale management and conservation practices.
KW - community
KW - dominance
KW - environmental predictors
KW - forests
KW - macroecology
KW - rarity
KW - species abundance
KW - species population threats
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85198729556&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1111/geb.13889
DO - 10.1111/geb.13889
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85198729556
SN - 1466-822X
VL - 33
JO - Global Ecology and Biogeography
JF - Global Ecology and Biogeography
IS - 10
M1 - e13889
ER -
