Geographic variation in leaf traits and palatability of a native plant invader during domestic expansion

Like alien plant invasion, range expansion of native plants may threaten biodiversity and economies, rendering them native invaders. Variation in abiotic and biotic conditions across a large geographic scale greatly affects variation in traits and interactions with herbivores of native plant invaders, which is an interesting yet mostly unexplored issue. We used a common garden experiment to compare defensive/nutritional traits and palatability to generalist herbivores of 20 native- (23.64–30.18°N) and introduced-range (31.58–36.87°N) populations of Reynoutria japonica, which is a native invader following range expansion in China. We analysed the relationships among herbivore pressure, climate, plant chloroplast haplotypes, leaf traits and herbivore performance. Of the 16 variables tested, we observed range differences in 11 variables and latitudinal clines in nine variables. In general, herbivores performed better on the introduced plants than on the native plants and better on the high..., , , # Data from: Geographic variation in leaf traits and palatability of a native plant invader during domestic expansion

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.ngf1vhj1g](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.ngf1vhj1g)

This dataset contains information of range, latitude, population and haplotype on a total of 20 populations of *Reynoutria japonica* from its native and introduced ranges in China. It also contains data of 9 plant traits and 7 indices of herbivore performance, as well as variables of temperature, precipitation, herbivory pressure at sampling sites.

## Description of the data and file structure

The first four columns of the data (i.e. Populations, Range, Latitude, and Source_rhizome) describe the status information of *Reynoutria japonica.* Columns 5-11 (i.e. SL_larval_growth in ***mg***, SL_biomass_conversion_efficiency in ***mg/cm^2***, SL_leaf_area_consumed in ***cm^2***, SE_larval_growth in ***mg***, SE_biomass_conversion_efficiency in ***mg/cm^2***, SE_leaf_area_consumed in ***cm^2...