More salt, please: global patterns, responses and impacts of foliar sodium in grasslands.
- Borer ET Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN, 55108, USA.
- Lind EM Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN, 55108, USA.
- Firn J Queensland University of Technology (QUT), School of Earth, Environmental and Biological Sciences, Science and Engineering Faculty, Brisbane, Qld., 4001, Australia.
- Seabloom EW Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN, 55108, USA.
- Anderson TM Wake Forest University, Department of Biology, 049 Winston Hall, Winston-Salem, NC, 27109, USA.
- Bakker ES Department of Aquatic Ecology, Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW), Droevendaalsesteeg 10, 6708 PB, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
- Biederman L Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology, Iowa State University, 251 Bessey Hall, Ames, Iowa, 50010, USA.
- La Pierre KJ Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, 647 Contees Wharf Road, Edgewater, MD, 21037, USA.
- MacDougall AS Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, Canada, N1G2W1.
- Moore JL School of Biological Sciences, Monash University, Vic, 3800, Australia.
- Risch AC Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, Zuercherstrasse 111, 8903, Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
- Schutz M Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, Zuercherstrasse 111, 8903, Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
- Stevens CJ Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University, Lancaster, LA1 4YQ, UK.
- 2019-05-11
Published in:
- Ecology letters. - 2019
Biogeography
Nutrient Network (NutNet)
herbivory
nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, micronutrients
plant taxonomy
Adaptation, Physiological
Animals
Grassland
Herbivory
Nitrogen
Plants
Sodium
Soil
English
Sodium is unique among abundant elemental nutrients, because most plant species do not require it for growth or development, whereas animals physiologically require sodium. Foliar sodium influences consumption rates by animals and can structure herbivores across landscapes. We quantified foliar sodium in 201 locally abundant, herbaceous species representing 32 families and, at 26 sites on four continents, experimentally manipulated vertebrate herbivores and elemental nutrients to determine their effect on foliar sodium. Foliar sodium varied taxonomically and geographically, spanning five orders of magnitude. Site-level foliar sodium increased most strongly with site aridity and soil sodium; nutrient addition weakened the relationship between aridity and mean foliar sodium. Within sites, high sodium plants declined in abundance with fertilisation, whereas low sodium plants increased. Herbivory provided an explanation: herbivores selectively reduced high nutrient, high sodium plants. Thus, interactions among climate, nutrients and the resulting nutritional value for herbivores determine foliar sodium biogeography in herbaceous-dominated systems.
- Language
-
- English
- Open access status
- green
- Identifiers
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- DOI 10.1111/ele.13270
- PMID 31074933
- Persistent URL
- https://sonar.ch/global/documents/93219
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