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Premise Determining which traits characterize strategies of coexisting species is important to developing trait‐based models of plant communities. First, global dimensions may not exist locally. Second, the degree to which traits and trait spectra constitute independent dimensions of functional variation at various scales continues to be refined. Finally, traits may be associated with existing categorical groupings. Methods We assessed trait integration and differentiation across 57 forest understory plant species in Douglas‐fir forests of western Oregon, United States. We combined measurements for a range of traits with literature‐based estimates of seed mass and species groupings. We used network analysis and nonmetric multidimensional scaling ordination (NMS) to determine the degree of integration. Results We observed a strong leaf economics spectrum (LES) integrated with stem but not root traits. However, stem traits and intrinsic water‐use efficiency integrated LES and root traits. Network analyses indicated a modest grouping of a priori trait dimensions. NMS indicated that multivariate differences among species were related primarily to (1) rooting depth and plant height vs. specific root length, (2) the LES, and (3) leaf size vs. seed mass. These differences were related to species groupings associated with growth and life form, leaf lifespan and seed dispersal mechanisms. Conclusions The strategies of coexisting understory plant species could not be reduced to a single dimension. Yet, species can be characterized efficiently and effectively for trait‐based studies of plant communities by measuring four common traits: plant height, specific leaf area, leaf size, and seed mass.

Ecological theory aids in understanding how disturbances affect ecosystems. However, experimental data are often complex, with multiple post‐disturbance theories potentially applying simultaneously to the same ecosystem. This emphasizes the need for tools to experimentally test these theoretical predictions. We introduce MicroEcoTools, an R package designed to test ecological framework predictions using microbial community data. It assesses microbial diversity and evaluates the relative impacts of stochastic and deterministic assembly mechanisms through a taxa‐based null model approach for replicated designs. Furthermore, the package allows application of Grime's trait‐based life‐history categories—competitor, stress‐tolerant and ruderal (CSR)—to taxa, functional traits and ecosystem functions within microbial communities. MicroEcoTools also includes relevant statistical tests, numeric simulations and publicly available datasets for demonstration. To demonstrate MicroEcoTools' functionality, we applied the package to experimental data from microcosm‐scale perturbation experiments on an activated sludge microbial ecosystem (included in the R package). This enabled us to assess assembly mechanisms and assign CSR categories. Results generated by MicroEcoTools closely aligned with previous findings from manual analysis. In conclusion, MicroEcoTools facilitates the application of ecological frameworks, including community assembly mechanisms, diversity analysis, and life‐history strategies, to microbial ecosystems under disturbance. This R package, along with its source code, can be freely accessed on GitHub at https://www.github.com/Soheil‐A‐Neshat/MicroEcoTools.

Aim Extreme droughts, intensified by climate change, threaten floodplain ecosystems. However, the mechanisms underlying biotic responses remain insufficiently understood. We assessed drought‐induced changes in the taxonomic and functional structure of fish communities, identified key environmental and biotic drivers during the drought period, and evaluated post‐drought community recovery trajectories. Location Poyang Lake, Yangtze River Basin, China. Methods Fish assemblages were surveyed across four floodplain lakes of Poyang Lake from 2022 to 2024 during the same seasonal window to isolate drought effects. Community composition and traits were analysed in multivariate trait space to assess changes in functional identity and the abundance of key species, and diversity indices at multiple scales were calculated. Key environmental drivers were identified using ordination and trait‐environment association analyses. Results Extreme drought induced substantial shifts in fish community structure and functional composition, favouring small‐bodied, benthopelagic omnivores and causing a 94% decline in the abundance of the apex predator Culter alburnus. Simultaneously, taxonomic and functional α‐diversity declined significantly, while β‐diversity increased, driven primarily by species turnover. The mechanisms underlying community assembly also shifted, with physicochemical factors predominant before the drought, but macrophyte growth form and macrobenthic biomass becoming the dominant drivers during drought conditions. Although hydrological connectivity was restored in 2024, community recovery remained incomplete, characterised by only partial functional trait rebound and persistent suppression of taxonomic richness, particularly among habitat specialists. Main Conclusions Extreme drought functioned as a basin‐scale filter, selectively favouring fish assemblages with drought‐tolerant trait combinations while leading to the decline or local extinction of intolerant taxa. The resulting habitat contraction and fragmentation reduced the local capacity to support biodiversity and promoted niche partitioning along gradients of habitat structure and food availability. Even after the restoration of hydrological connectivity, drought‐induced habitat legacies and priority effects constrained specialist recovery, impeding the re‐establishment of pre‐drought community composition.

Through competition for pollinators, invasive plants may suppress native flora. Community-level studies provide an integrative assessment of invasion impacts and insights into factors that influence the vulnerability of different native species. We investigated effects of the nonnative herb Lynthrum salicaria on pollination of native species in 14 fens of the eastern United States. We compared visitors per flower for 122 native plant species in invaded and uninvaded fens and incorporated a landscape-scale experiment, removing L. salicaria flowers from three of the invaded fens. Total flower densities were more than three times higher in invaded than uninvaded or removal sites when L. salicaria was blooming. Despite an increase in number of visitors with number of flowers per area, visitors per native flower declined with increasing numbers of flowers. Therefore, L. salicaria invasion depressed visitation to native flowers. In removal sites, visitation to native flowers was similar to uninvaded sites, confirming the observational results and also suggesting that invasion had not generated a persistent buildup of visitor populations. To study species-level impacts, we examined effects of invasion on visitors per flower for the 36 plant species flowering in both invaded and uninvaded fens. On average, the effect of invasion represented about a 20% reduction in visits per flower. We measured the influence of plant traits on vulnerability to L. salicaria invasion using meta-analysis. Bilaterally symmetrical flowers experienced stronger impacts on visitation, and similarity in flower color to L. salicaria weakly intensified competition with the invader for visitors. Finally, we assessed the reproductive consequences of competition with the invader in a dominant flowering shrub, Dasiphora fruticosa. Despite the negative effect of invasion on pollinator visitation in this species, pollen limitation of seed production was not stronger in invaded than in uninvaded sites, suggesting little impact of competition for pollinators on its population demography. Negative effects on pollination of native plants by this copiously flowering invader appeared to be mediated by increases in total flower density that were not matched by increases in pollinator density. The strength of impact was modulated across native species by their floral traits and reproductive ecology.

Due to their large size and obligate nature, Cymothoid isopods inflict a high degree of tissue damage to fish. Still, they are understudied at an ecosystem level despite their global presence and ecological role. In this work, we collected fish host‐isopod parasite data, along with their life history and ecological traits, from the northern part of the east coast of India and investigated patterns in host specialisation and preference of isopod parasites using a trait‐based network perspective. We observed that the region of attachment of the parasite (buccal cavity, branchial cavity, and skin) and host fish ecology (schooling behaviour and habitat characteristics) influenced host specialisation and preference. We found that branchial cavity‐attaching parasites preferred schooling, pelagic fishes, whereas buccal cavity‐attaching parasites preferred mostly non‐schooling, demersal fishes. Skin‐attaching parasites were found to be generalists and had no preference based on our examined host traits. The fish‐parasitic isopods of family cymothoidae have different preferences for hosts according to their traits viz., demersal, pelagic, or according to their habitat in the water column.

Variation within species is an often‐overlooked aspect of community ecology, despite the fact that the ontogenetic structure of populations influences processes right up to the ecosystem level. Accounting for traits at the individual level is an important advance in the implementation of trait‐based approaches in understanding community structure and function. We incorporate individual‐ and species‐level traits into one succinct assemblage structure metric, fractional size, which is calculated as the length of an individual divided by its potential maximum length. We test the implementation of fractional size in demersal fish assemblages along a depth gradient in the deep sea. We use data from an extensive trawl survey at depths of 300–2030 m on the continental slope of the Rockall Trough, Northeast Atlantic, to compare changes in fractional size structure along an environmental gradient to those seen using traditional taxonomic and trait‐based approaches. The relationship between fractional size and depth was particularly strong, with the overall pattern being an increase with depth, implying that individuals move deeper as they grow. Body size increased with depth at the intraspecific and assemblage levels. Fractional size, size structure and species composition all varied among assemblages, and this variation could be explained by the depth that the assemblage occupied. The inclusion of individual‐level traits and population fractional size structure adds to our understanding at the assemblage level. Fractional size, or where an individual is in its growth trajectory, appears to be an especially important driver of assemblage change with depth. This has implications for understanding fisheries impacts in the deep sea and how these impacts may propagate across depths.

Species differ in vulnerability to anthropogenic land use changes. Knowledge of the mechanisms driving differential sensitivity can inform conservation strategies but is generally lacking for species-rich taxa in the tropics. The diverse bat fauna of Southeast Asia is threatened by rapid loss of forest and expanding agricultural activities, but the associations between species, traits, vulnerability to agriculture, and the underlying drivers have yet to be elucidated. We studied the responses of speciose insectivorous bat assemblages to robusta coffee cultivation in Sumatra, Indonesia. We compared abundance, species richness, and assemblage structures of bats between forests and coffee farms based on trapping data and evaluated the influence of vegetation complexity on assemblage composition and species-level reactions. Bat abundance and species richness were significantly lower in coffee farms than in forests. Bat assemblage structure differed between land uses, and the overall variation can be largely explained by vegetation simplification. Species sensitive to coffee agriculture were associated with more complex vegetation structure, whereas tolerant species were associated with simpler vegetation structure. Sensitive and tolerant species differed in the type, frequency, and bandwidth of echolocation calls and roost use. Species sensitive to coffee use broadband and high-pitched frequencymodulated calls, which are efficient at detecting insects in complex vegetation, and roost in plant structures that may be lost as vegetation is simplified. In contrast, tolerant species used lower pitched constant-frequency calls and roost in caves. We advocate for greater use of trait analyses in studies seeking to clarify the influence of agriculture on diverse tropical bat faunas.

Insect populations have become increasingly threatened during the last decades due to climate change and landuse intensification. Species characteristics driving these threats remain poorly understood. Trait‐based analyses provide a straight‐forward approach to gain a mechanistic understanding of species' extinction risk, guiding the development of conservation strategies. We combined morphological traits and phylogenetic relationship for 332 European species of butterflies and 115 species of odonates (dragon and damselflies) to model their red list status via phylogenetically controlled ordered logistic regression. We hypothesized that extinction risk increases with increasing body volume and wing area, decreasing range size, and is larger for brighter species. All investigated traits exhibited a strong phylogenetic signal. When controlling for phylogenetic relationship, we found that extinction risk of butterflies increased with decreasing range size. The extinction risk of odonates showed no relationship with the selected traits. Our results show that there is no universal trait defining the extinction risk of our investigated insect taxa. Furthermore, evolutionary history, measured as the phylogenetically predicted part of our analyzed traits, poorly predicted extinction risk. Our study confirms the focus of conservation measures on European butterfly species with small range sizes. A trait‐based analysis for European butterflies and odonates to gain a mechanistic understanding of species’ extinction risk. We found no universal trait defining the extinction risk of our investigated insect taxa. When controlling for phylogenetic relationship the extinction risk of butterflies increased with decreasing range size while extinction risk of odonates showed no relationship with the selected traits.

A striking pattern, seen in both fossil and extant taxa, is that tropical ectotherms are better at invading temperate habitats than vice versa. This is puzzling because tropical ectotherms, being thermal specialists, face a harsher abiotic environment and competition from temperate residents that are thermal generalists. We develop a mathematical framework to address this puzzle. We find that (i) tropical ectotherms can invade temperate habitats if they have higher consumption rates and lower mortality during warmer summers, (ii) stronger seasonal fluctuations at higher latitudes create more temporal niches, allowing coexistence of tropical invaders and temperate residents, and (iii) temperate ectotherms’ failure to invade tropical habitats is due to greater mortality rather than lower competitive ability. Our framework yields predictions about population-level outcomes of invasion success based solely on species’ trait responses to temperature. It provides a potential ecological explanation for why the tropics constitute both a cradle and a museum of biodiversity.

Global warming causes functional shifts and reorganisation in marine communities through range shifts to high-latitude reefs and cnidarian bleaching mortality in the tropics. Such changes threaten the integrity and structure of marine communities, especially as foundational and associated species are reduced or lost. However, comparatively little is known about the extent of range shifts and their ecological consequences for the overlooked components of marine ecosystems, such as octocorals and zoantharians (O + Z) on shallow coral reefs. As these groups play a crucial part in building complexity and sustaining life in reef communities, functional shifts in these taxa may cascade through the entire ecosystem, but these processes have not been quantified. Here, we examined the environmental drivers and functional consequences of spatial variation in octocoral and zoantharian communities across 27 sites in southern Japan, spanning from tropical to warm-temperate waters. We collated a trait database for 42 entities (species, genus, and family level identifications) of octocorals and zoantharians and calculated functional diversity and functional richness to measure functional compositional change. We identified five functional groups according to their trait similarities and identified how their abundances respond to changing environmental factors with general additive models (GAMs). We found functional shifts among octocorals and zoantharians across the tropical to temperate thermal gradient, with the abundances of two functional groups best explained by gradients in minimum sea surface temperature. Non-linear relationships between the functional groups and thermal gradients imply a more intricate relationship than expected, suggesting other non-temperature-based drivers, e.g., nitrogen or pH levels might also play an important role. Only functional group richness and species richness showed significant correlations with latitude, whilst functional diversity and functional richness did not. Our results indicate that octocoral and zoantharian communities and functionality potentially undergo shifts with clear community compositional changes, influenced by climate change across environmental gradients. However, the taxonomy and identification of these taxa remain difficult, and information on functional traits is often sparse or not species-specific, indicating a clear need for further basic zoological and ecological work on octocorals and zoantharians.