Plant adaptive strategies respond to environmental change across European grassland habitats

Grassland ecosystems are facing rapid and ongoing change driven by intensified land‐use and accelerated climate change, highlighting the urgent need to understand their potential adaptation and response to environmental change. We analyzed data from 52 980 vegetation plots spanning all major grassland habitats in Europe (including alpine, rocky, sandy, saline, dry, mesic and wet grasslands). We quantified competitive (C), stress‐tolerant (S), and ruderal (R) strategies for 7858 plant species based on key functional traits and mapped the spatial patterns of C‐, S‐ and R‐strategies across European grasslands. Using random forest models, we evaluated the relative importance of environmental factors in shaping these patterns and explored potential changes in the distribution of C‐, S‐ and R‐strategies under future climate scenarios. We further investigated how these strategies and their environmental drivers vary across grassland habitats. Our results revealed a clear biogeographical gradient in the distribution of C‐, S‐ and R‐strategies from predominantly stress‐tolerant strategies in Mediterranean grasslands to greater representation of competitive and ruderal strategies in temperate regions. Climate and soil factors emerged as major drivers shaping these patterns at the continental scale. Projected responses to future climate change varied among regions: grasslands in the Atlantic and Continental regions were projected to decrease in C‐strategy and increase in both S‐ and R‐strategy representation, whereas grasslands in Arctic and boreal regions exhibited contrasting trends. Mediterranean grasslands were projected to undergo a transition from mainly R‐strategy toward S‐strategy species predominance. Furthermore, the strategy patterns and their key drivers differed among grassland habitats, with patterns largely reflecting habitat‐specific environmental constraints. This study demonstrates the utility of Grime's CSR framework for characterizing broad‐scale patterns of plant adaptive strategies across diverse grassland habitats. It highlights region‐ and habitat‐specific differences in potential responses to future climate change, with implications for targeted grassland management and restoration.

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Journal
Ecography
Published
2026-05-21
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/ecog.08334
Primary Topic
Species Distribution and Climate Change
Type
article
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article

Plant adaptive strategies respond to environmental change across European grassland habitats

Ilona Knollová, Jan Divíšek, Valerijus Rašomavičius, Emmanuel Garbolino et al.
Ecography
Species Distribution and Climate Change
article

Plant adaptive strategies respond to environmental change across European grassland habitats

Ilona Knollová, Jan Divíšek, Valerijus Rašomavičius, Emmanuel Garbolino, Ricarda Pätsch, Svetlana Aćić, Eszter Ruprecht, Irena Axmanová, K Vassilev, Yue Wang, Hans Henrik Bruun, Attila Lengyel, Milan Chytrý, Jonathan Lenoir, Wen‐Yong Guo, Idoia Biurrun, Urban Šilc, Jürgen Dengler, Aaron Pérez‐ Haase, Tetiana Dziuba, Xiao‐Peng Tan, Petr Pyšek
article en

Abstract

Grassland ecosystems are facing rapid and ongoing change driven by intensified land‐use and accelerated climate change, highlighting the urgent need to understand their potential adaptation and response to environmental change. We analyzed data from 52 980 vegetation plots spanning all major grassland habitats in Europe (including alpine, rocky, sandy, saline, dry, mesic and wet grasslands). We quantified competitive (C), stress‐tolerant (S), and ruderal (R) strategies for 7858 plant species based on key functional traits and mapped the spatial patterns of C‐, S‐ and R‐strategies across European grasslands. Using random forest models, we evaluated the relative importance of environmental factors in shaping these patterns and explored potential changes in the distribution of C‐, S‐ and R‐strategies under future climate scenarios. We further investigated how these strategies and their environmental drivers vary across grassland habitats. Our results revealed a clear biogeographical gradient in the distribution of C‐, S‐ and R‐strategies from predominantly stress‐tolerant strategies in Mediterranean grasslands to greater representation of competitive and ruderal strategies in temperate regions. Climate and soil factors emerged as major drivers shaping these patterns at the continental scale. Projected responses to future climate change varied among regions: grasslands in the Atlantic and Continental regions were projected to decrease in C‐strategy and increase in both S‐ and R‐strategy representation, whereas grasslands in Arctic and boreal regions exhibited contrasting trends. Mediterranean grasslands were projected to undergo a transition from mainly R‐strategy toward S‐strategy species predominance. Furthermore, the strategy patterns and their key drivers differed among grassland habitats, with patterns largely reflecting habitat‐specific environmental constraints. This study demonstrates the utility of Grime's CSR framework for characterizing broad‐scale patterns of plant adaptive strategies across diverse grassland habitats. It highlights region‐ and habitat‐specific differences in potential responses to future climate change, with implications for targeted grassland management and restoration.

Ecography
University of Copenhagen (DK), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR), Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg (DE), University of the Basque Country (ES), Charles University (CZ), Masaryk University (CZ), Babeș-Bolyai University (RO), Zhejiang Ocean University (CN), University of Belgrade (RS), Institute of Ecology and Botany (HU), Institute for Biodiversity (DE), Biodiversity Research Institute (US), Karst Research Institute (SI), Ecologie et Dynamique des Systèmes Anthropisés (FR), Zhoushan Hospital (CN), Zhoushan Science and Technology Bureau (CN), Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research (BG), Czech Academy of Sciences, Institute of Botany (CZ), Nature Research Centre (LT), HUN-REN Centre for Ecological Research (HU), Institut de Biologia Evolutiva (ES), M.G. Kholodny Institute of Botany (UA), Shanghai Estuarine & Coastal Science Research Center (CN), University of Bayreuth (DE), East China Normal University (CN), École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Paris (FR), Universitat de Barcelona (ES), ZHAW Zurich University of Applied Sciences (CH)
Climate action
Openalex Percentile: Top 5%
Species Distribution and Climate Change
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