Data package for NutNet project: Compositional variation in grassland plant communities (60 sites, 2007-2020)

Data associated with a manuscript examining compositional variation in grassland plant communities around the globe. We used a globally distributed experiment to examine variation in species composition within 60 grasslands on 6 continents. Each site had an identical experimental and sampling design: 24 plots x 4 years. We expressed compositional variation within each site—not across sites—using abundance- and incidence-based metrics of the magnitude of dissimilarity (Bray-Curtis and Sorensen, respectively), abundance- and incidence-based measures of the relative importance of replacement (balanced variation and species turnover, respectively), and species richness at two scales (per plot-year (alpha) and per site (gamma)). We assessed species composition separately for each site and then compared patterns among sites, asking: (1) How does small-scale compositional variation differ among grasslands?; (2) Can compositional variation within a site be predicted by its biotic and abiotic context?; and (3) Does a combination of metrics enhance our understanding of the ecological processes at individual sites? This data package includes the site-specific values of each metric and the explanatory variables used to predict differences in compositional variation among sites. Scripts to conduct analyses and create figures and tables are also provided.