Phenotypic plasticity affects species packing in seasonally fluctuating environments

Abstract

Environmental variability influences the evolution of phenotypic plasticity and the ecological interactions among species in communities, but it is unclear how these processes interact to affect ecological systems across scales. We investigate models describing how plasticity evolves in competitive communities exposed to seasonal variation in abiotic conditions. We conducted eco-evolutionary analyses to identify communities of coexisting species with evolutionarily stable plasticity traits. These analyses revealed that the presence of interspecific competitors constrained the evolution of plasticity in some species, which instead evolved to be specialists. Plasticity often impaired species coexistence by allowing individual species to control more niche space. Communities containing plastic species were usually less species-rich but more productive and less variable. Similar results were obtained when plasticity rate was evolutionarily labile, but plasticity rate altered the patterning of temporal niche partitioning. This work shows how plasticity and competition combine to shape ecological and trait responses to environmental variability.