Dynamic plant-soil microbe interactions: the neglected effect of soil conditioning time

Plant-soil feedbacks (PSF) may change in strength over the life of plant individuals as plants continue to modify the soil microbial community. However, the temporal variation in PSF is rarely quantified and its impacts on plant communities remain unknown. 

Using a chronosequence reconstructed from annual aerial photos of a coastal dune ecosystem, we characterized >20-year changes in soil microbial communities associated with individuals of the four dominant perennial species, one legume and three non-legume. We quantified the effects of soil biota on conspecific and heterospecific seedling performance in a greenhouse experiment that preserved soil properties of these individual plants. We used a general individual-based model to explore the potential consequences of temporally varying PSF on plant community assembly.

In all plant species, microbial communities changed with plant age. However, plant's response to the turnover in microbial composition depended on the transplante...