Bark is a vital and very visible part of woody plants, yet only recently has bark characteristics
started to be considered as key traits structuring communities and biomes. Bark thickness is …

Eucalypts encounter a wide range of severe disturbances such as extensive defoliation by
insects, major structural damage from cyclonic winds, as well as foliage and bark loss during …

We introduce the AusTraits database-a compilation of values of plant traits for taxa in the
Australian flora (hereafter AusTraits). AusTraits synthesises data on 448 traits across 28,640 …

This book explores the geography, ecology, and antiquity of'open ecosystems', which
include grasslands, savannas, and shrublands. They occur in climates that can support …

Tropical savannas have a ground cover dominated by C4 grasses, with fire and herbivory
constraining woody cover below a rainfall‐based potential. The savanna biome covers 50 …

Global variation in total bark thickness (TBT) is traditionally attributed to fire. However, bark
is multifunctional, as reflected by its inner living and outer dead regions, meaning that, in …

The whole‐plant economics spectrum (PES) refers to the trade‐offs among the many plant
functional traits that are commonly used as indicators of major adaptive strategies, thereby …

In tropical landscapes, vegetation patches with contrasting tree densities are distributed as
mosaics. However, the locations of patches and densities of trees within them cannot be …

The causes underlying bark diversity are unclear. Variation has been frequently attributed to
environmental differences across sites. However, variation may also result from tradeoffs …

Fire and herbivory are the main disturbances shaping the structure of savannas. In these
ecosystems, the key strategies by which woody plants escape fire are either early height …