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The roles of climate and soil nutrients in shaping the life histories of grasses native to the Cape Floristic Region

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Abstract

Aims

We hypothesized that in seasonally-arid systems the evolution of annuality is controlled by both moisture regime and substrate quality, with infertile soils either precluding annuality or selecting for improved nutrient acquisition in annuals. The grass flora of the Cape Floristic Region to test these ideas.

Methods

We compared intrinsic variation in life history and nutrient acquisition traits between populations of Ehrharta calycina J. E. Sm. (Poaceae) situated along an aridity gradient and on diverse substrates. We also evaluated the importance of moisture regime and substrate as predictors of life history across 79 Cape grass species.

Results

In E. calycina, rhizome survivorship, plant growth and reproductive maturation rate were interrelated and closely tied to wet season duration. By contrast, life history variation was poorly correlated with soil nutrients, and there was little evidence of enhanced nutrient acquisition in annual populations. Across multiple species, however, substrate was identified as a significant co-predictor of life history.

Conclusion

Our identification of substrate as an important predictor of life history across multiple species but not within E. calycina is not paradoxical, since E. calycina consistently acts as an annual species in avoiding the ultra-oligotrophic, quartzitic sands that dominate the Cape mountains. Overall, our data support the joint influence of climate and substrate on the evolution of annuality and associated life history traits.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Ian Newton for mass-spectrometer analyses; Desmond Barnes and Edward Chirwa for help with plant cultivation; Chloe Galley for Pentameris specimen co-ordinate data; and Hans Lambers, Simon Power and two anonymous reviewers for valuable comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript. This work was funded through a University of Cape Town URC award and a National Research Foundation grant to GAV.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Botany, University of Cape Town, Private Bag, 7700, Rondebosch, South Africa

    G. Anthony Verboom, Timothy E. Moore, Vera Hoffmann & Michael D. Cramer

  2. School of Plant Biology, Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Perth, WA, 6009, Australia

    Michael D. Cramer

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  1. G. Anthony Verboom
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  2. Timothy E. Moore
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  3. Vera Hoffmann
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  4. Michael D. Cramer
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Correspondence to G. Anthony Verboom.

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Responsible Editor: Hans Lambers.

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Verboom, G.A., Moore, T.E., Hoffmann, V. et al. The roles of climate and soil nutrients in shaping the life histories of grasses native to the Cape Floristic Region. Plant Soil 355, 323–340 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-011-1102-6

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