Aims: We introduce ReSurveyEurope — a new data source of resurveyed vegetation plots in Europe, compiled by a collaborative network of vegetation scientists. We describe the scope of this initiative, provide an overview of currently available data, governance, data contribution rules, and accessibility. In addition, we outline further steps, including potential research questions.Results: ReSurveyEurope includes resurveyed vegetation plots from all habitats. Version 1.0 of ReSurveyEurope contains 283,135 observations (i.e., individual surveys of each plot) from 79,190 plots sampled in 449 independent resurvey projects. Of these, 62,139 (78%) are permanent plots, that is, marked in situ, or located with GPS, which allow for high spatial accuracy in resurvey. The remaining 17,051 (22%) plots are from studies in which plots from the initial survey could not be exactly relocated. Four data sets, which together account for 28,470 (36%) plots, provide only presence/absence information on plant species, while the remaining 50,720 (64%) plots contain abundance information (e.g., percentage cover or cover–abundance classes such as variants of the Braun‐Blanquet scale). The oldest plots were sampled in 1911 in the Swiss Alps, while most plots were sampled between 1950 and 2020.Conclusions: ReSurveyEurope is a new resource to address a wide range of research questions on fine‐scale changes in European vegetation. The initiative is devoted to an inclusive and transparent governance and data usage approach, based on slightly adapted rules of the well‐established European Vegetation Archive (EVA). ReSurveyEurope data are ready for use, and proposals for analyses of the data set can be submitted at any time to the coordinators. Still, further data contributions are highly welcome.

Most biodiversity dynamics and ecosystem processes on land take place in microclimates that are decoupled from the climate as measured by standardised weather stations in open, unshaded locations. As a result, microclimate monitoring is increasingly being integrated in many studies in ecology and evolution. Overviews of the protocols and measurement methods related to microclimate are needed, especially for those starting in the field and to achieve more generality and standardisation in microclimate studies. Here, we present 10 practical guidelines for ground‐based research of terrestrial microclimates, covering methods and best practices from initial conceptualisation of the study to data analyses. Our guidelines encompass the significance of microclimates; the specifics of what, where, when and how to measure them; the design of microclimate studies; and the optimal approaches for analysing and sharing data for future use and collaborations. The paper is structured as a chronological guide, leading the reader through each step necessary to conduct a comprehensive microclimate study. At the end, we also discuss further research avenues and development in this field. With these 10 guidelines for microclimate monitoring, we hope to stimulate and advance microclimate research in ecology and evolution, especially under the pressing need to account for buffering or amplifying abilities of contrasting microhabitats in the context of global climate change.

Question: Infrequent events of extreme drought or extreme temperatures may considerably affect the structure and functioning of vegetation. Here we investigate how fluctuations in precipitation and temperature shape year‐to‐year dynamics and plant species composition in a dry grassland community, and how this variation affects plants with different life histories.Location: Dry grassland (Festucion valesiacae) in the Pavlov Hills, SE Czech Republic.Methods: Long‐term trends in vegetation change in the grassland studied were assessed by the ordination of plot records from vegetation surveys performed between 1930 and 2019. In addition, year‐to‐year changes in vegetation were studied in seven permanent plots of 16 m² surveyed annually from 1993 to 2018. Variation in species composition and abundances was related to temperature and precipitation in the preceeding two springs, summers, autumns and winters using ordinations and mixed‐effect linear models.Results: There were no remarkable directional changes in the grassland community over the period 1930–2019. However, during the last 25 years, the community exhibited pronounced year‐to‐year fluctuations, which depended on weather conditions in the previous two years. Species with different life histories (e.g. perennials vs. annuals) and different ecology (e.g. ruderal vs. dry‐grassland species) responded differently to specific weather patterns. Perennials were sustained by wet summers, annuals benefitted from wet springs and autumns and moderately warm and wet winters, and covers of ruderals of mixed life histories increased after dry summers.Conclusions: Plant species composition in a Central European dry grassland shows remarkable year‐to‐year dynamics in response to weather patterns over the previous two years. These community changes are non‐directional and contribute to the stability of this grassland, which has not changed considerably over the past 90 years. However, increasing frequency of drought events because of ongoing climate change can result in a directional change with an expansion of ruderal species.

The occurrence and origin of dry grasslands and their rich biota in the moderately humid Central‐European climate have fascinated scientists for over a century. Modern palaeoecological and phylogeographical data support earlier hypotheses that these grasslands are late Pleistocene relicts and can therefore be considered part of the Eurasian forest–steppe biome. However, it is still unclear which factors fostered the maintenance of steppe patches in Central Europe throughout the Holocene. Here, we provide an overview of the main hypotheses, which stress, respectively, the effects of climate, edaphic conditions and disturbances. We then develop a general conceptual framework on how these three factors interact to form forest–steppe mosaics. We thereby emphasize the role of topography as a crucial control on forest–steppe patterns at the landscape scale. Topography is related to several mechanistic drivers that influence vegetation processes, such as near‐surface microclimate and soil formation. Consequently, topographic variation allows both forest and steppe patches to occur beyond their macroclimatic niche, favouring the development of forest–steppe mosaics. To illustrate our framework, we demonstrate the interactive effect of macroclimate and topography on the occurrence of steppe patches at 108 selected Central European forest–steppe sites. Although we developed our framework focusing on the current distribution of Central European forest–steppe, we suggest that it contributes to the understanding of similar transitions between temperate forest and steppe biomes in the past as well as elsewhere in the world.

Complex topography regulates near‐surface temperature above the treeline. It may thus sustain microrefugia for alpine plants and relax the need of shifting upward when the climate warms. The effectiveness of these microrefugia rests on the premise that plant distributions in alpine landscapes are mainly controlled by fine‐scale topographic variation. We tested this assumption by relating the distribution of 79 plant species and 10 community attributes across 900 1 m² plots in a landscape spanning 1677 m of elevation to 17 topographical descriptors at resolutions between 1 and 301 m. We found that the presence of most species and most community attributes were better explained by topographic variation at coarser scales (> 20 m). Fine‐scale topography is more clearly reflected in moisture than in temperature requirements of species. The elevational gradient rather than topographic variation at any scale, is the single most important driver of both species distributions and the variation in community attributes in the area studied. We hypothesise that our results reveal a hitherto underestimated influence of spatial mass effects on alpine plant distributions. These effects can override environmental filtering at fine scales and will thus impede the survival of cold‐adapted plants in small and fragmented refugia under climate warming.