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Plant size and spatial pattern in a natural population of Myosotis micrantha
Author(s) -
Wilson Chester,
Gurevitch Jessica
Publication year - 1995
Publication title -
journal of vegetation science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.1
H-Index - 115
eISSN - 1654-1103
pISSN - 1100-9233
DOI - 10.2307/3236398
Subject(s) - competition (biology) , transect , biology , biomass (ecology) , population size , population , intraspecific competition , plant density , spatial distribution , ecology , agronomy , statistics , mathematics , demography , sowing , sociology
. We examined spatial distributions and plant sizes along a transect through a natural population of a winter annual, Myosotis micrantha . A size hierarchy existed, as indicated by high values of Gini coefficients of inequality for plant mass and correlated measures. Plants with no immediate conspecific neighbors were larger than plants with one or more near neighbors, suggesting that competition from near neighbors depressed plant size. However, there was strong positive spatial autocorrelation in plant size: large plants were associated with large neighbors and small ones with small neighbors. Plant size was also positively correlated with the combined biomass of near neighbors. The population formed a two‐phase mosaic of patches of relatively large plants alternating with patches of smaller plants. The data suggest that individual plants compete with conspecifics, but the effects of competition are symmetrical. The most likely explanations for this spatially structured size hierarchy are variation in plant density, patchy distribution of resources, or a combination of the two.