Summary 1 Interpreting the functional diversity of vegetation is important in unravelling the
relationship between environmental change, community composition and ecosystem …

Most of our knowledge of the effect of grazing on grassland structure is based on grazed–
ungrazed contrasts. The effects of grazing in the most common scenario, where grazing …

Predicting ecosystem responses to global change is a major challenge in ecology. A critical
step in that challenge is to understand how changing environmental conditions influence …

Maintaining or enhancing the productive capacity and resilience of rangeland ecosystems is
critical for the continued support of people who depend on them for their livelihoods …

Background and Aims A standardized methodology to assess the impacts of land-use
changes on vegetation and ecosystem functioning is presented. It assumes that species …

A growing body of empirical evidence suggests that the temporal stability of communities
typically increases with diversity. The counterview to this is that dominant species, rather …

Summary 1 Climate change is recognized as a major threat to the survival of species and
integrity of ecosystems world‐wide. Although considerable research has focused on climate …

In biodiversity conservation of agriculture‐driven landscapes, grasslands have an
outstanding importance; their conservation became a top priority both in research and …

Different components of biodiversity may vary independently of each other along
environmental gradients giving insights into the mechanisms that regulate species …

Plant community ecology has traditionally taken a taxonomical approach based on
population dynamics. This book contrasts such an approach with a trait-based approach …