Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat?
Most plant species have a range of traits that deter herbivores. However, understanding of how different defences are related to one another is surprisingly weak. Many authors argue that defence traits trade off against one another, while others argue that they form coordinated defence syndromes....
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Journal Article |
| Published: |
Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
2013
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/6947 |
| _version_ | 1848745224143110144 |
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| author | Moles, A. Peco, B. Wallis, I. Foley, W. Poore, A. Seabloom, E. Vesk, P. Bisigato, A. Cella-Pizarro, L. Clark, C. Cohen, P. Cornwell, W. Edwards, W. Ejrnaes, R. Gonzalez-Ojeda, T. Graae, B. Hay, G. Lumbwe, F. Magana-Rodriquez, B. Moore, B. Peri, P. Poulsen, J. Stegen, J. Veldtman, R. Zeipel, H. Andrew, N. Boulter, S. Borer, E. Cornelissen, J. Farji-Brener, A. DeGabriel, J. Jurado, E. Kyhn, L. Mulder, C. Low, B. Reardon-Smith, K. Rodriguez-Velazquez, J. Fortier, A. Zheng, Z. Blendinger, P. Enquist, B. Facelli, J. Knight, T. Majer, Jonathan Martinez-Ramos, M. McQuillan, P. Hui, F. |
| author_facet | Moles, A. Peco, B. Wallis, I. Foley, W. Poore, A. Seabloom, E. Vesk, P. Bisigato, A. Cella-Pizarro, L. Clark, C. Cohen, P. Cornwell, W. Edwards, W. Ejrnaes, R. Gonzalez-Ojeda, T. Graae, B. Hay, G. Lumbwe, F. Magana-Rodriquez, B. Moore, B. Peri, P. Poulsen, J. Stegen, J. Veldtman, R. Zeipel, H. Andrew, N. Boulter, S. Borer, E. Cornelissen, J. Farji-Brener, A. DeGabriel, J. Jurado, E. Kyhn, L. Mulder, C. Low, B. Reardon-Smith, K. Rodriguez-Velazquez, J. Fortier, A. Zheng, Z. Blendinger, P. Enquist, B. Facelli, J. Knight, T. Majer, Jonathan Martinez-Ramos, M. McQuillan, P. Hui, F. |
| author_sort | Moles, A. |
| building | Curtin Institutional Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Most plant species have a range of traits that deter herbivores. However, understanding of how different defences are related to one another is surprisingly weak. Many authors argue that defence traits trade off against one another, while others argue that they form coordinated defence syndromes. We collected a dataset of unprecedented taxonomic and geographic scope (261 species spanning 80 families, from 75 sites across the globe) to investigate relationships among four chemical and six physical defences. Five of the 45 pairwise correlations between defence traits were significant and three of these were tradeoffs. The relationship between species’ overall chemical and physical defence levels was marginally nonsignificant (P = 0.08), and remained nonsignificant after accounting for phylogeny, growth form and abundance. Neither categorical principal component analysis (PCA) nor hierarchical cluster analysis supported the idea that species displayed defence syndromes. Our results do not support arguments for tradeoffs or for coordinated defence syndromes. Rather, plants display a range of combinations of defence traits. We suggest this lack of consistent defence syndromes may be adaptive, resulting from selective pressure to deploy a different combination of defences to coexisting species. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T06:13:57Z |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | curtin-20.500.11937-6947 |
| institution | Curtin University Malaysia |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T06:13:57Z |
| publishDate | 2013 |
| publisher | Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd. |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | curtin-20.500.11937-69472023-02-22T06:24:22Z Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? Moles, A. Peco, B. Wallis, I. Foley, W. Poore, A. Seabloom, E. Vesk, P. Bisigato, A. Cella-Pizarro, L. Clark, C. Cohen, P. Cornwell, W. Edwards, W. Ejrnaes, R. Gonzalez-Ojeda, T. Graae, B. Hay, G. Lumbwe, F. Magana-Rodriquez, B. Moore, B. Peri, P. Poulsen, J. Stegen, J. Veldtman, R. Zeipel, H. Andrew, N. Boulter, S. Borer, E. Cornelissen, J. Farji-Brener, A. DeGabriel, J. Jurado, E. Kyhn, L. Mulder, C. Low, B. Reardon-Smith, K. Rodriguez-Velazquez, J. Fortier, A. Zheng, Z. Blendinger, P. Enquist, B. Facelli, J. Knight, T. Majer, Jonathan Martinez-Ramos, M. McQuillan, P. Hui, F. spines plant– - herbivore interactions leaf toughness tannin cyanogenesis lipid extrafloral - nectaries hair Most plant species have a range of traits that deter herbivores. However, understanding of how different defences are related to one another is surprisingly weak. Many authors argue that defence traits trade off against one another, while others argue that they form coordinated defence syndromes. We collected a dataset of unprecedented taxonomic and geographic scope (261 species spanning 80 families, from 75 sites across the globe) to investigate relationships among four chemical and six physical defences. Five of the 45 pairwise correlations between defence traits were significant and three of these were tradeoffs. The relationship between species’ overall chemical and physical defence levels was marginally nonsignificant (P = 0.08), and remained nonsignificant after accounting for phylogeny, growth form and abundance. Neither categorical principal component analysis (PCA) nor hierarchical cluster analysis supported the idea that species displayed defence syndromes. Our results do not support arguments for tradeoffs or for coordinated defence syndromes. Rather, plants display a range of combinations of defence traits. We suggest this lack of consistent defence syndromes may be adaptive, resulting from selective pressure to deploy a different combination of defences to coexisting species. 2013 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/6947 10.1111/nph.12116 Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd. unknown |
| spellingShingle | spines plant– - herbivore interactions leaf toughness tannin cyanogenesis lipid extrafloral - nectaries hair Moles, A. Peco, B. Wallis, I. Foley, W. Poore, A. Seabloom, E. Vesk, P. Bisigato, A. Cella-Pizarro, L. Clark, C. Cohen, P. Cornwell, W. Edwards, W. Ejrnaes, R. Gonzalez-Ojeda, T. Graae, B. Hay, G. Lumbwe, F. Magana-Rodriquez, B. Moore, B. Peri, P. Poulsen, J. Stegen, J. Veldtman, R. Zeipel, H. Andrew, N. Boulter, S. Borer, E. Cornelissen, J. Farji-Brener, A. DeGabriel, J. Jurado, E. Kyhn, L. Mulder, C. Low, B. Reardon-Smith, K. Rodriguez-Velazquez, J. Fortier, A. Zheng, Z. Blendinger, P. Enquist, B. Facelli, J. Knight, T. Majer, Jonathan Martinez-Ramos, M. McQuillan, P. Hui, F. Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| title | Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| title_full | Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| title_fullStr | Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| title_full_unstemmed | Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| title_short | Correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| title_sort | correlations between physical and chemical defences in plants: tradeoffs, syndromes, or just many different ways to skin a herbivorous cat? |
| topic | spines plant– - herbivore interactions leaf toughness tannin cyanogenesis lipid extrafloral - nectaries hair |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/6947 |