Ecology: Diversity and stability in plant communities

Abstract

The relationship between species diversity and ecosystem stability is controversial1, 2. Tilman et al.3 analyse biomass patterns over a decade in a grassland experiment with artificial plant communities, and provide evidence for a positive relationship between the number of plant species and the temporal stability of the ecosystem. Here we use data from a long-term biodiversity experiment with plant communities that were not controlled by weeding4 in order to show that diverse systems can be both stable and unstable.