Data from: Microenvironment and functional-trait context dependence predict alpine plant community dynamics

Predicting the structure and dynamics of communities is difficult.
Approaches linking functional traits to niche boundaries, species
co‐occurrence and demography are promising, but have so far had limited
success. We hypothesized that predictability in community ecology could be
improved by incorporating more accurate measures of fine‐scale
environmental heterogeneity and the context‐dependent function of traits.
We tested these hypotheses using long term whole‐community demography data
from an alpine plant community in Colorado. Species distributions along
microenvironmental gradients covaried with traits important for
below‐ground processes. Positive associations between species
distributions across life stages could not be explained by abiotic
microenvironment alone, consistent with facilitative processes. Rates of
growth, survival, fecundity and recruitment were predicted by the direct
and interactive effects of trait, microenvironment, macroenvironment and
neighbourhood axes. Synthesis. Context‐dependent interactions between
multiple traits and microenvironmental axes are needed to predict
fine‐scale community structure and dynamics.