Asymmetric climate warming does not benefit plant invaders more than natives

Both climate warming and biological invasions are primary threats to species diversity and its functioning. Although asymmetric climate warming (i.e., nighttime temperatures increasing faster than daytime temperatures) has long been recognized, its effects on plant invasions remain poorly explored. We report on one field experiment that compared the responses of 18 native plants and 17 invasive plants to three warming regimes: daytime warming (07: 00–19:00), nighttime warming (19:00–07:00), and diurnal warming (07:00–07:00). We found that invasive and native plants exhibited similar survival under the daytime and nighttime warming; however, invasive plants had lower survival than native plants under the diurnal warming. Regardless of warming conditions, invasive and native plants were similar in total biomass, leaf and root areas, biomass allocation, temperature sensitivity, and phenotypic plasticity. Across invasive and native plants, nighttime warming increased total biomass, but daytime and diurnal warming did not. In addition, three warming treatments differentially influenced temperature sensitivity or phenotypic plasticity. Our findings show that plant invaders might not profit more from asymmetric climate warming than natives in tolerance, growth, and plasticity, and also highlight that considering the disparate effects of asymmetric climate warming may be useful for assessing plant invasion outcomes. The map of Jiangxi Province of China (left panel), and ★ indicates the experimental site in the study. An illustration of the warming experiment (upper right panel), and the infrared radiator or dummy heater was suspended 1.6 m above ground level. Plant survival and total biomass of native and invasive species grown under different warming treatments (lower right panel). [Display omitted] •Invasive plants had marginally lower survival than native plants under warming.•Invasive and native plants were similar in growth and plasticity under warming.•Day, night, and diurnal warming had different effects on plant performance.