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Latitudinal variation in palatability of saltmarsh plants: which traits are responsible?

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Date Issued:
2002
Title: Latitudinal variation in palatability of saltmarsh plants: which traits are responsible?.
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Name(s): Siska, Erin L., creator
Pennings, Steven C., creator
Buck, Tracy L., creator
Hanisak, M. Dennis, creator
Type of Resource: text
Genre: Article
Issuance: single unit
Date Issued: 2002
Publisher: The Ecological Society of America
Extent: 14 p.
Physical Description: pdf
Language(s): English
Identifier: 1930474 (digitool), FADT1930474 (IID), fau:5486 (fedora), 10.1890/0012-9658(2002)083[3369:LVIPOS]2.0.CO;2 (doi)
Note(s): Biogeographic theory predicts that intense consumer-prey interactions at low latitudes should select for increased defenses of prey relative to high latitudes. In salt marshes on the Atlantic coast of the United States, a community-wide pattern exists in which 10 species of low-latitude plants are less palatable to a diverse suite of herbivores than are high-latitude conspecifics. Examination of proximate plant traits (toughness, palatability of polar and nonpolar extracts, nitrogen content) of high- and low-latitude conspecifics of nine plant species suggested that all these proximate traits had the potential to contribute to latitudinal differences in palatability of some plant species. Southern plants were tougher than northern plants (five species), had less palatable polar extracts (four species), and had lower N content (six species). Experimental evidence linking traits to latitudinal differences in palatability was strongest for polar extracts and lacking for N content.
This manuscript is available at http://www.esajournals.org/loi/ecol and may be cited as: Siska, E. L., Pennings, S. C., Buck, T. L. & Hanisak, M. D. (2002) Latitudinal variation in palatability of saltmarsh plants: which traits are responsible? Ecology, 83(12)3369-3381
Florida Atlantic University. Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute contribution #1476.
Subject(s): Biogeography
Persistent Link to This Record: http://purl.flvc.org/FCLA/DT/1930474
Restrictions on Access: ©2002 by the Ecological Society of America
Host Institution: FAU