Plant Life

Histories
EMMANUEL R.
GUIWAN
MAEd-ES
September 28, 2019
Plant Life Histories
 Plant Strategies
• Plant strategies include mechanisms & responses
plants use to reproduce, defend, survive, & compete
on the landscape.
• Plants must make trade-offs when responding to
their environment. These trade-offs & responses lay
the groundwork for classifying the strategies that
emerge.
Plant Strategies
 J.P.Grime (1977,1979)
• He proposed that variation in
environmental conditions has led to the
development of distinctive strategies or life
histories among plants.
J.P.Grime (1977,1979)
 Two Factor Gradients
• The 2 variables that he selected as most important
in exerting selective pressure on plants were:

Intensity of Disturbance Intensity of Stress

Two Factor Gradients
STRESSES INCLUDE FACTORS SUCH AS THE
AVAILABILITY OF WATER, NUTRIENTS, AND LIGHT, AL
ONG WITH GROWTH-INHIBITING INFLUENCES LIKE TE
MPERATURE AND
TOXINS.

DISTURBANCE ENCOMPASSES HERBIVOR

Y,
PATHOGENS, ANTHROPOGENIC INTERACTIONS, FIRE,
J.P.Grime
 FOUR EXTREME ENVIRONMENT
AL TYPES
1 . LOW-DISTURBANCE - LOW-STRESS
2 . LOW-DISTURBANCE - HIGH-STRESS
3 . HIGH-DISTURBANCE - LOW-STRESS
4 . HIGH-DISTURBANCE - HIGH-STRESS
J.P.Grime
 Three Plant Strategies
1 . COMPETITIVE
2 . STRESS-TOLERANT
3 . RUDERAL
Ruderals
 Ruderals are plants that live in highly
disturbed habitats and that may depend on
disturbance to persist in the face of potenti
al competition from other plants.
 They can live in high disturbance but low
stress.
 Focus: Rapid Growth & Seed Reproduction
 Ruderal = Weed, Good Colonists
Ruderals

Bonfire Moss
Annual Meadow-Grass (Funaria hygrometrica)

Arabidopsis thaliana
Stress-Tolerant
 Stress-Tolerators are more tolerant to the
environmental extremes that
occur.
 They can live in high stress but low
disturbance.
 Evergreen, They grow slowly,
Unpalatable
 Focus: Maintenance & Defenses
(Anti-Herbivory)
Stress-Tolerators

Beech Tree
Common Dog-Violet
Alpine Azalea (Kalmia procumbens) (Viola riviniana)
Competitive
 Competitors occupy environments
where disturbance intensity is low and
the intensity of stress is also low.
 High growth rate = ↑Competition
 Focus: Competition for Resources
Competitors

Japanese Knotweed
(Fallopia japonica)

Birch Tree
Grime's C-S-R Triangle
C
John Philip
Grime,
1979

S R
r and K Selection vs. CSR Trian
gle
According to Grime:

 r Selection = Ruderal strategy

C
 intermediate = Competitiv
e strategy
 K selection = Stress-toleranT
strategy

S R
Plant Life
Histories
EMMANUEL R.
GUIWAN
Thank you v.much!