Data from: The monocotyledonous underground: global climatic and phylogenetic patterns of geophyte diversity

Geophytes—plants typically with a bulb, corm, tuber or rhizome—are
economically and evolutionarily important; however, the drivers of their
morphological diversity remain unknown. Using a comprehensive phylogeny of
monocots, we test for correlations between climate and growth form to
better understand why we observe such a diversity of geophyte underground
traits. Understanding the evolutionary factors promoting independent
origins of these organs will lend insights into how plants adapt to
environmental hardships. Using a phylogeny incorporated with global
occurrence and climate data for the monocots, we investigated whether
climatic patterns could explain differences between geophytes and
non-geophytes, as well as differences among bulbous, cormous, tuberous,
rhizomatous, and non-geophytic taxa. We used phylogenetically-informed
ANOVAs, MANOVAs and PCAs to test differences in climatic variables between
growth forms. Geophytes inhabit cooler, drier and thermally variable
climates compared to non-geophytes. Although some underground traits
(i.e., bulb, corm, and tuber) appear to inhabit particular niches, our
data has limited evidence for an overall role of climate in the evolution
of these traits. However, temperature may be a driving force in rhizome
evolution, as well as the evolution of taxa considered here as
non-geophytes. Our results suggest that temperature should be more
strongly considered as a factor promoting the evolution of belowground bud
placement, specifically as it relates to rhizomatous taxa. Bulbous,
cormous and tuberous taxa need closer examination of other mechanisms,
such as anatomical constraints or genetic controls, in order to begin to
understand the causes behind the evolution of their underground
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