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The success of biological control agents — organisms used to reduce the success of other, usually non-native invasive species — is complicated by ongoing climate change. Chosen for their host-specificity and introduced into new locations, biological agents can succumb to both direct and indirect climate-related stressors, compromising their biology and activity against target organisms. Adding to this is the fact that environmental stressors often occur in concert, making it hard to predict the efficacy of biological control programs. More

Lerato Shikwambana from the South African National Space Agency and the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa, and colleagues also from South Africa compared the wildfire emissions of a strong El Niño event in 2015–2016 and a pronounced La Niña event in 2010–2011. They find that both a strong El Niño and La Niña event can increase emissions from wildfires compared with average years, but they affect different regions, with the effect of La Niña reaching farther south than El Niño. Overall, emissions are stronger during the El Niño phase, mainly driven by higher air temperatures. ENSO variability is expected to increase with future warming, which would also make strong El Niño events more likely. Therefore, these findings indicate that the exposure to wildfire air pollution could grow in southern Africa. More

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Study speciesTo increase our ability to generalize the results, we conducted two multispecies experiments34. The experiments were designed independently, but, as they used similar treatments, we analyzed them jointly to further increase generalizability. For the experiment in China, we selected eight species that are either native or non-native in China (Supplementary Table 1). For the experiment in Germany, we selected 16 species that are either native or non-native in Germany (Supplementary Table 1). All 24 species, representing seven families, are herbaceous, mainly occur in grasslands, and are common in the respective regions. To control for phylogenetic non-independence of species, we selected at least one non-native and one native species in each of the seven families. All non-native species are fully established (i.e. naturalized sensu Richardson et al.35) in the country where the respective experiment was conducted, and, as they are common, most of them could be considered invasive36,37. We classified the species as naturalized non-native or native to China or Germany based on the following databases: (1) “The Checklist of the Alien Invasive Plants in China”38, (2) the Flora of China (www.efloras.org), and (3) BiolFlor (www.ufz.de/biolflor). Seeds or stem fragments of the study species were obtained from local botanical gardens, local commercial seed companies, or from wild populations (Supplementary Table 1).The experiment in ChinaFrom 21 May to 27 June 2020, we planted or sowed the eight study species into plastic trays filled with potting soil (Pindstrup Plus, Pindstrup Mosebrug A/S, Denmark). We sowed the species at different times (Supplementary Table 1) because they were known to require different times until germination. Three species were grown from stem fragments because they mainly rely on clonal propagation, and the others were propagated from seeds (Supplementary Table 1).On 13 July 2020, we transplanted the cuttings or seedlings into 2.5-L circular plastic pots filled with a mixture of sand and vermiculite (1:1 v/v). Three competition treatments were imposed: (1) competition-free, in which plants were grown alone; (2) intraspecific competition, in which two individuals of the same species were grown together; (3) interspecific competition, in which two individuals, each from a different species were grown together. We grew all eight species without competition, in intraspecific competition, and in all 28 possible pairs of interspecific competition. For the competition-free and intraspecific-competition treatments, we replicated each species seven times (i.e. we had seven technical replicates). For the interspecific-competition treatment, for which we had many pairs of species (i.e. biological replicates), we replicated each pair two times.The experiment took place in a greenhouse at the Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (Changchun, China). The greenhouse had a transparent plastic film on the top, which reduced the ambient light intensity by 12%. It was open on the sides so that insects and other organisms could enter. To vary nutrient availability, we applied to each pot either 5 g (low-nutrient treatment) or 10 g (high-nutrient treatment) of a slow-release fertilizer (Osmocote® Exact Standard, Everris International B.V., Geldermalsen, The Netherlands; 15% N + 9% P2O5 + 12% K2O + 2% MgO + trace elements). To vary light availability, we used two cages (size: 9 m × 4.05 m × 1.8 m). One of them was covered with two layers of black netting material, which reduced the light intensity by 71% (low light-intensity treatment, where the light intensity was on average 233.5 μmol m−2 s−1, measured on a sunny day). The other was left uncovered (high light-intensity treatment, where the light intensity was on average 826.7 μmol m−2 s−1).The experiment included a total of 672 pots ([8 no-competition × 7 replicates + 8 intraspecific-competition × 7 replicates + 28 interspecific-competition × 2 replicates]×2 nutrient treatments × 2 light treatments). The pots were randomly assigned to positions and were randomized once on 15 August within each block (i.e. the low or high light-intensity treatment). The initial height of each plant was measured on 15 July 2020, two days after the transplanting. We watered the plants daily to avoid water limitations. On 1 September 2020, we harvested the aboveground biomass of all plants. The biomass was dried at 65°C for 72 h to constant weight and then weighed to the nearest mg.The experiment in GermanyOn 15 June 2020, we sowed seeds of the 16 species into plastic trays filled with potting soil (Topferde, Einheitserde Co). On 6 July 2020, we transplanted the seedlings into 1.5-L pots filled with a mixture of potting soil and sand (1:1 v/v). Like the experiment in China, we imposed three competition treatments: competition-free, intraspecific competition, and interspecific competition. However, in this experiment, which had two times more species than the experiment in China, we only included 24 randomly chosen species pairs for the interspecific-competition treatment, and all of these pairs consisted of one naturalized non-native and one native species. For the competition-free treatment, we replicated each species two times (i.e. we had two technical replicates). For the competition treatments, we did not use technical replicates for any of the species combinations for logistic reasons. However, as we had a large number of species pairs in the inter-specific competition treatment, we had many biological replicates.The experiment took place outdoors in the Botanical Garden of the University of Konstanz (Konstanz, Germany). To vary nutrient availability, we applied to each pot once a week either 100 ml of a low-concentration liquid fertilizer (low-nutrient treatment; 0.5‰ Universol ® Blue oxide fertilizer, 18% N + 11% P + 18% K + 2.5% MgO + trace elements) or 100 ml of a high-concentration of the same liquid fertilizer (high-nutrient treatment; 1‰). In total, pots in the low- and high-nutrient treatment received 0.4 and 0.8 g fertilizer, respectively. To vary light availability, we used eight metal wire cages (size: 2 m × 2 m × 2 m). Four of the cages were covered with one layer of white and one layer of green netting material, which reduced the ambient light intensity by 84% (low light-intensity treatment; where the light intensity was on average 219.0 μmol m−2 s−1, measured on a sunny day). The remaining four cages were covered only with one layer of the white netting material, which served as a positive control for the effect of netting and reduced light intensity by 53% (high light-intensity treatment; where the light intensity was on average 678.4 μmol m−2 s−1). In other words, the low light-intensity treatment received 34% (66% reduction) of the light intensity in the high light-intensity treatment.The experiment included a total of 320 pots ([16 no-competition × 2 replicates + 16 intraspecific-competition + 32 interspecific-competition]×2 nutrient treatments × 2 light treatments). The eight cages were randomly assigned to fixed positions in the botanical garden. The pots were randomly assigned to the eight cages (40 pots in each cage) and were re-randomized once within and across cages of the same light treatment on 3 August 2020. Besides the weekly fertilization, we watered the plants two or three times a week to avoid water limitations. On 7 and 8 September 2020, we harvested the aboveground biomass of all plants. The biomass was dried at 70 °C for 96 h to constant weight and then weighed to the nearest 0.1 mg.Statistical analysesAll analyses were performed using R version 3.6.139. To test whether resource availability affected competitive outcomes between native and non-native species, we applied linear mixed-effects models to analyze the biomass of the plants in the two experiments jointly and separately, using the nlme package40. For the model used to analyze the two experiments jointly, we excluded interspecific competition between two non-natives and interspecific competition between two natives from the experiment in China, because non-native-non-native and native-non-native combinations were not included in the experiment in Germany. When we analyzed each experiment separately, the results were overall similar to the results of the joint analysis. Therefore, we focus in the manuscript on the joint analysis and present the results of the separate analyses in Supplementary Note 2.Because plant mortality was low and mainly happened after transplanting, we excluded pots in which plants had died. The final dataset contained 1180 individuals from 871 pots. In the model, we included the aboveground biomass of individuals as the response variable. We included the origin of the species (non-native or native), competition treatment (see below for details), nutrient treatment, light treatment and their interactions as fixed effects; study site (China or Germany), and identity and family of the species as random effects. In addition, we allowed each species to respond differently to the nutrient and light treatments (i.e. we included random slopes). To account for pseudoreplication41, we also included pots as random effects and cages (ten cages, eight from Germany and two from China) as random block effects. In the competition treatment, we had three levels: (1) no competition, (2) intraspecific competition, and (3) interspecific competition between native and non-native species. To split them into two contrasts, we created two variables42 testings (1) the effect of the presence of competitors, and (2) the difference between intra- and interspecific competition (see Supplementary Note 3 for details). To improve the normality of the residuals, we natural-log-transformed aboveground biomass. To improve the homoscedasticity of the residuals, we allowed the species and competition treatment to have different variances by using the varComb and varIdent functions43. Significances of the fixed effects were assessed with likelihood-ratio tests (type II) with the car package44.To determine the ‘competitive outcome’, i.e. which species will exclude or dominate over the other species at the endpoint for the community45,46, one should ideally conduct a long-term study. Alternatively, one could vary the density of each species, which mimics the dynamics of species populations across time (see refs. 47,48 for examples). However, applying this space-for-time-substitution method would have largely increased the size of the experiment, especially when combined with the light and nutrient treatments. Still, by growing plants alone, in intraspecific competition and in interspecific competition, our experiments meet the minimal requirement for measuring competitive outcome, at least in terms of short-term biomass production46,49.In the linear mixed-effects model of individual biomass, a significant effect of origin would indicate that native and naturalized non-native species differed in their biomass production, across all competition and resource-availability (light and nutrients) treatments. This would tell us the competitive outcome between non-natives and natives across different resource availabilities. For example, an overall higher level of biomass production of non-native species would indicate that non-natives would dominate when competing with natives. A significant interaction between a resource-availability treatment and the origin of the species would indicate that resource availability affects the biomass production of native and non-native species differently, averaged across all competition treatments. In other words, it would indicate that resource availability affects the competitive outcome between natives and non-natives. A significant interaction between a resource-availability treatment and the competition treatment would indicate that resource availabilities modify the effect of competition (e.g. no competition vs. competition). Other studies frequently have inferred competitive outcomes from the effect of competition by calculating the relative interaction intensity50. However, while the competitive outcome and effect of competition are often related, they are not equivalent45. This is because the competitive outcome is both determined by the effect of competition and intrinsic growth rate48,49. For example, a plant species that strongly suppress other species but has a low intrinsic growth rate still cannot dominate the community.Reporting summaryFurther information on research design is available in the Nature Research Reporting Summary linked to this article. More

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