Competitive ability of native and alien plants: effects of residence time and invasion status

Competition is commonly thought to underlie the impact of plant invasions. However, competitive effects of aliens and competitive response of natives may also change over time. Indeed, as with time the novelty of an invader decreases, the accumulated eco-evolutionary experience of resident species may eventually limit invasion success. We aimed to gain insights on whether directional changes in biotic interactions over time, or more general differences between natives and aliens, for instance resulting from an introduction bias, are relevant in determining competitive ability. We conducted a pairwise competition experiment in a target-neighbour design, using 47 Asteraceae species with residence times between 8-12,000 years in Germany. We first tested whether there are differences in performance in intraspecific competition among invasion status groups, that is casual and established neophytes, archaeophytes, or native species. We then evaluated whether competitive response and effects d...