DOI: 10.5061/dryad.7wm37pw6p
title: Data from: Does nutrient scarcity lead to greater variability in seed production? The case of the California valley oak <em>Quercus lobata</em>

description: Based on an interspecific comparison, Fernández-Martinez et al. found that
 masting is stronger in populations growing under conditions of nutrient
 scarcity, a relationship potentially providing a mechanistic link to
 resource-budget models of mast fruiting. Using comparisons among
 individual Quercus lobata, a common California masting oak species, we
 tested whether access to ground water, foliar nitrogen (N), and foliar
 phosphorus (P) correlate with greater inter-annual acorn crop variability,
 increased synchrony of acorn production with other trees in the
 population, and more negative lag-1 autocorrelations with acorn production
 the prior year—metrics indicative of masting-like behavior. Our analyses
 failed to support the nutrient scarcity hypothesis. Three of the
 significant correlations between masting metrics and resources were in the
 opposite direction predicted by the hypothesis—trees with greater foliar N
 showed greater variability and synchrony in acorn production—while the
 other two (more water-stressed trees exhibited larger coefficients of
 variation [CV] in interannual acorn production) were apparently due to the
 inverse relationship between CV and mean overall productivity. More
 studies at different geographic and taxonomic scales and of other
 potentially important nutrients are needed to understand the relationship
 between masting and resources.
description: # Data from: Does nutrient scarcity lead to greater variability in seed
 production? The case of the California valley oak *Quercus lobata* Dataset
 DOI: [10.5061/dryad.7wm37pw6p](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.7wm37pw6p) ##
 Description of the data and file structure Data testing the nutrient
 scarcity hypothesis of Fernandez-Martinez (Nature Plants 5: 1222-1228
 (2019) within a population of valley oak (*Quercus lobata*) in California.
 ### Files and variables #### File: nutrient_data_for_submission.xls
 **Description:** Data ##### Variables * Tree ID: unique ID for the tree *
 N years   N years of data for each tree (45) * xLN30Mean overall tree
 productivity based on the annual 30 s visual surveys (ln-transformed) *
 lnCV: Coefficient of variation (using the ln-transformed data) *
 Kvalseth: Alternative form of the coefficient of variation (Kvalseth’s
 CV), also ln-transformed * Prop variability: Proportional variability
 (PV); quantifies how variable productivity is relative to its mean. *
 Volatility: Measure of fluctuations in productivity * Pairwise synchrony
  Mean r with all other individuals in the population * AR1: Lag-1
 autocorrelation; shows how much a tree’s productivity in one year is
 correlated with its productivity in the previous year. * XWP Predawn xylem
 water potential (in MPa) * foliar N: Leaf nitrogen concentration Total N
 (%) * foliar P: Leaf phosphorus concentration. (Total P (%) * N:P ratio
 Ratio of foliar N:foliar P ## Access information Other publicly accessible
 locations of the data: * None Data was derived from the following sources:
 * None