TABLE 3.

Functional traits of phytoplankton spanning the three primary ecological axes of interest

Guild	Ecological axis			Trait	Trait values
Phytoplankton	Resource acquisition	Reproduction	Predator defence	Cell length μm	≤10*
					>10‐25*
					>25‐100*
					>100*
				Surface area:volume ratio μm2/μm3	<0.5*
					>0.5‐1.0*
					>1.0‐5.0*
					>5.0‐10.0*
					>10.0*
				Organic carbon ratio	Numeric
				Trophy	Autotrophic/mixotrophic
				Nitrogen fixing	Yes/no
			Predator defence	Filamentous	Yes/no
		Reproduction		Mobility	None/flagellated/rapheated
				Colonial	Colonial
					Not colonial
				Siliceous	Yes/no

Note: Quantitative, qualitative and fuzzily coded values are possible, with fuzzy subcategories indicated by an *.