Community Ecology
Volume/Issue:
Volume 13: Issue 2
Similarity between grassland vegetation and seed bank shifts with altered precipitation and clipping, but not warming
Authors:
S. White University of Alberta Department of Biological Sciences Edmonton Canada

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E. Bork University of Alberta Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science Edmonton Canada

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J. Karst University of Alberta Department of Biological Sciences Edmonton Canada

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J. Cahill University of Alberta Department of Biological Sciences Edmonton Canada

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Pages:
129–136
Online Publication Date:
21 Nov 2012
Publication Date:
01 Dec 2012
Article Category:
Journal Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1556/comec.13.2012.2.1
Keywords:
Disturbance; Global change; Grazing; Plant ecology; Rangeland
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Similarity between seed bank and aboveground vegetation is frequently studied in order to better understand how community composition is affected by factors such as disturbance and succession. Grassland plant communities are known to be sensitive to shifts in precipitation and increases in temperature associated with climate change, but we do not know if and how these factors interact to affect the similarity between seed bank and aboveground vegetation. Also unknown is how the impact of grazing, the dominant land-use in grasslands, will interact with climatic conditions to affect similarity. We manipulated precipitation and temperature, and cut vegetation (as a proxy for grazing) at a grassland site for three years. Percent cover of aboveground vegetation was estimated in the third year, and compared with persistent seed bank samples taken in the year prior from the same plots. Similarity increased with reduced precipitation, was unresponsive to warming, and decreased with clipping. The aboveground community responded strongly to the treatments, while the seed bank community did less so, suggesting similarity responses were largely driven by changes in aboveground vegetation. Because of the importance of the seed bank in vegetation regeneration, understanding the relationship between seed bank and aboveground vegetation will improve our understanding of plant community dynamics under climate change and varied management (grazing) intensities.

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Cover Community Ecology
Community Ecology An Interdisciplinary Journal Reporting Progress in Community and Population Studies
Print ISSN:
1585-8553
Online ISSN:
1588-2756

Community Ecology
Language English
Size A4
Year of
Foundation		 2000
Volumes
per Year		 1
Issues
per Year		 3
Founder Akadémiai Kiadó
Founder's
Address		 H-1117 Budapest, Hungary 1516 Budapest, PO Box 245
Publisher Akadémiai Kiadó
Springer Nature Switzerland AG
Publisher's
Address		 H-1117 Budapest, Hungary 1516 Budapest, PO Box 245.
CH-6330 Cham, Switzerland Gewerbestrasse 11.
Responsible
Publisher		 Chief Executive Officer, Akadémiai Kiadó
ISSN 1585-8553 (Print)
ISSN 1588-2756 (Online)

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