About me
Soil as an agent of range limitation for sundial lupine
Understanding the ecological factors that limit fitness and impose range limits for at-risk plants is crucial for both increasing fitness of existing populations and establishing new ones. Soil is known to have a major influence on plant range limits, but accurately predicting the importance of soil in limiting the distribution of a particular species remains challenging; individual species respond differently to soil, most fine-scale soil data is based on estimates, and at present, soil maps do not account for the biotic component of the soil (i.e., microbial communities). Despite growing recognition that soil properties warrant increased consideration as agents of range limitation, our understanding of how soil constrains the distribution of Canada’s at-risk plants remains extremely limited. To address this gap, I am conducting greenhouse experiments using sundial lupine (an at-risk perennial plant with a limited distribution in Canada) to answer the following questions: (Q1) does suitable soil exist beyond the species’ northern range-edge? (Q2) Does variability in putatively important abiotic soil properties explain variation in performance? (Q3) Does variation in the biotic component of soil explain variation in performance across the northern range-edge? Preliminary results suggest that suitable soil exists beyond the plant's current range, but variation in performance is explained more by site than range position.
