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We give a comprehensive review of Chesson's coexistence theory, summarizing, for the first time, all its fundamental details in one single document. Our goal is for both theoretical and empirical ecologists to be able to use the theory to interpret their findings, and to get a precise sense of the limits of its applicability. To this end, we introduce an explicit handling of limiting factors, and a new way of defining the scaling factors that partition invasion growth rates into the different mechanisms contributing to coexistence. We explain terminology such as relative nonlinearity, storage effect, and growth-density covariance, both in a formal setting and through their biological interpretation. We review the theory's applications and contributions to our current understanding of species coexistence. While the theory is very general, it is not well suited to all problems, so we carefully point out its limitations. Finally, we critique the paradigm of decomposing invasion growth rates into stabilizing and equalizing components: we argue that these concepts are useful when used judiciously, but have often been employed in an overly simplified way to justify false claims., Funding Agencies|Swedish Research Council [VR 2017-05245]; NSF [DEB 1457515]

We give a comprehensive review of Chesson's coexistence theory, summarizing, for the first time, all its fundamental details in one single document. Our goal is for both theoretical and empirical ecologists to be able to use the theory to interpret their findings, and to get a precise sense of the limits of its applicability. To this end, we introduce an explicit handling of limiting factors, and a new way of defining the scaling factors that partition invasion growth rates into the different mechanisms contributing to coexistence. We explain terminology such as relative nonlinearity, storage effect, and growth-density covariance, both in a formal setting and through their biological interpretation. We review the theory's applications and contributions to our current understanding of species coexistence. While the theory is very general, it is not well suited to all problems, so we carefully point out its limitations. Finally, we critique the paradigm of decomposing invasion growth rates into stabilizing and equalizing components: we argue that these concepts are useful when used judiciously, but have often been employed in an overly simplified way to justify false claims., Funding Agencies|Swedish Research Council [VR 2017-05245]; NSF [DEB 1457515]

We give a comprehensive review of Chesson's coexistence theory, summarizing, for the first time, all its fundamental details in one single document. Our goal is for both theoretical and empirical ecologists to be able to use the theory to interpret their findings, and to get a precise sense of the limits of its applicability. To this end, we introduce an explicit handling of limiting factors, and a new way of defining the scaling factors that partition invasion growth rates into the different mechanisms contributing to coexistence. We explain terminology such as relative nonlinearity, storage effect, and growth-density covariance, both in a formal setting and through their biological interpretation. We review the theory's applications and contributions to our current understanding of species coexistence. While the theory is very general, it is not well suited to all problems, so we carefully point out its limitations. Finally, we critique the paradigm of decomposing invasion growth rates into stabilizing and equalizing components: we argue that these concepts are useful when used judiciously, but have often been employed in an overly simplified way to justify false claims., Funding Agencies|Swedish Research Council [VR 2017-05245]; NSF [DEB 1457515]

We give a comprehensive review of Chesson's coexistence theory, summarizing, for the first time, all its fundamental details in one single document. Our goal is for both theoretical and empirical ecologists to be able to use the theory to interpret their findings, and to get a precise sense of the limits of its applicability. To this end, we introduce an explicit handling of limiting factors, and a new way of defining the scaling factors that partition invasion growth rates into the different mechanisms contributing to coexistence. We explain terminology such as relative nonlinearity, storage effect, and growth-density covariance, both in a formal setting and through their biological interpretation. We review the theory's applications and contributions to our current understanding of species coexistence. While the theory is very general, it is not well suited to all problems, so we carefully point out its limitations. Finally, we critique the paradigm of decomposing invasion growth rates into stabilizing and equalizing components: we argue that these concepts are useful when used judiciously, but have often been employed in an overly simplified way to justify false claims., Funding Agencies|Swedish Research Council [VR 2017-05245]; NSF [DEB 1457515]

We give a comprehensive review of Chesson's coexistence theory, summarizing, for the first time, all its fundamental details in one single document. Our goal is for both theoretical and empirical ecologists to be able to use the theory to interpret their findings, and to get a precise sense of the limits of its applicability. To this end, we introduce an explicit handling of limiting factors, and a new way of defining the scaling factors that partition invasion growth rates into the different mechanisms contributing to coexistence. We explain terminology such as relative nonlinearity, storage effect, and growth-density covariance, both in a formal setting and through their biological interpretation. We review the theory's applications and contributions to our current understanding of species coexistence. While the theory is very general, it is not well suited to all problems, so we carefully point out its limitations. Finally, we critique the paradigm of decomposing invasion growth rates into stabilizing and equalizing components: we argue that these concepts are useful when used judiciously, but have often been employed in an overly simplified way to justify false claims., Funding Agencies|Swedish Research Council [VR 2017-05245]; NSF [DEB 1457515]

Natural enemies are ubiquitous in nature. In many communities, natural enemies have a major effect on the diversity of their prey. Their effects are very diverse: they can promote or undermine the ability of their prey to coexist through a variety of mechanisms. As such, an important step in understanding how diversity is maintained will be to understand how different forms of predator behavior affect prey coexistence. In this dissertation, I study how two major types of predators affect plant coexistence in two different communities. First, I study natural enemies in tropical forests, using both theory and empirical work. In tropical forests, most natural enemies are thought have a narrow host range, and be distance-responsive (i.e., mainly harm seeds and seedlings that are near adults of their main host). Previous theoretical work has shown that specialized natural enemies can maintain diversity of their prey, whether or not they are distance-responsive. However, it is unknown whether specialist natural enemies are more or less able to promote prey coexistence if they are distance-responsive. Using theoretical models, I show that distance-responsive predators are less able to maintain diversity. Additionally, I show that habitat partitioning does not interfere with the ability of distance-responsive predators to maintain diversity, even if it causes seedling survival to be highest near conspecific adults. From an empirical aspect, I studied the host range of seed-associated fungi. Soilborne microbes, such as fungi, are thought to play an important role in maintaining diversity in tropical forests. However, the microbial community itself is often treated as a black box, and little is known about which microbes are causing major effects, or how 8 specialized seed-microbe associations are. Here I use experimental inoculations to examine the host range and effect of a guild of seed-associated fungi that are thought to be mainly pathogens. I show that fungal species ar