20.500.12556/DKUM-90232 A link between species abundance and plant strategies for semi-natural dry grasslands Due of the potential of species to determine ecosystem properties, it is important to understand how species abundance influences community assembly. Using vegetation surveys on 35 dry grasslands in north-east Slovenia, we defined dominant (8) and subordinate (61) plant species. They were compared on 14 traits to test for differences in community-weighted mean (CWM) and functional diversity (FD). We found that dominants and subordinates differed strongly in their functional traits. Dominants showed higher leaf dry matter content and a more pronounced stress tolerance strategy and were all clonal with a large proportion of species with rhizomes and a rich bud bank, while other species showed a higher specific leaf area, a longer flowering period and more ruderals. For most traits, FD was higher in subordinates. Our results suggest that dominants drive community structure by limited susceptibility to non-competitive processes. Dominants may have positive effects on subordinates by mitigating environmental stressors. Subordinates are able to assemble together by being dissimilar and use different fine-scale niches that are engineered and homogenised by dominants. Our results show that there are fundamental differences in the relative importance of ecological processes between dominant and subordinate plants in species-rich grasslands, which is also important for their conservational management. species coexistence biodiversity community assembly species dominance subordinate species Festuco-Brometea plant functional traits community structure sobivanje vrst biotska raznovrstnost podrejene vrste funkcionalne lastnosti rastline true false true Angleški jezik Slovenski jezik Goričko (Slovenija); Znanstveno delo 2024-08-27 03:40:50 2025-02-26 10:46:20 2025-02-27 03:11:29 0000-00-00 00:00:00 2024 0 0 17 str. št. 16, št. članka 2260 Letn. 13 avg. 2024 0000-00-00 Zaloznikova Objavljeno NiDoloceno 2024-07-02 2024-08-12 2024-08-14 581.5(497.411) 205162243 10.3390/plants13162260 2223-7747 RAZ_Pipenbaher_Natasa_2024.pdf RAZ_Pipenbaher_Natasa_2024.pdf 1 2246EC5E1A3958FDEB2A68B0FDCC7388 c2972a8fa23b06dbd1e36d8e0b47138fb23e50adb0382881d652dfdced877045 7db2adc7-f426-11ef-a5fa-00155d000105 https://dk.um.si/Dokument.php?lang=slv&id=188848 https://www.mdpi.com/2223-7747/13/16/2260 1 6c93cfa6-6415-11ef-af0b-00155d000105 https://dk.um.si/Dokument.php?lang=slv&id=183411 Fakulteta za naravoslovje in matematiko 0 0 0