Influence of inundation characteristics on the distribution of dryland floodplain vegetation communities

Karimi, Sara Shaeri; Saintilan, Neil; Wen, Lei; Cox, Jonathan Peter; Valavi, Roozbeh

doi:10.1016/j.ecolind.2021.107429

Cited by 6 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…The spatial distribution of targeted vegetation communities of this study has been mapped in Figure 1b. Coolabah woodland covers 167 km 2 of the study area, whereas the other communities of interest for this study ( D. florulenta shrubland, E. camaldulensis forest/woodland and E. largiflorens woodland) cover a combined total area of 93 km 2 (Shaeri Karimi, Saintilan, Wen, Cox, & Valavi, 2021).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…SVTM is the most complete and consistent representation of the Plant Community Types (PCT) distribution across NSW (https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/vegetation/state-vegetation-type-map.htm). Four key flood‐dependent vegetation communities, E. camaldulensis (river red gum: RRG), E. largiflorens (black box: Bbox), E. coolabah (coolabah: Cool) and D. florulenta (lignum: Lig), were chosen for this study, as these were the most important vegetation communities on the Darling River Floodplain (Shaeri Karimi, Saintilan, Wen, Cox, & Valavi, 2021).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The model incorporates hydrologic, climatic and topographic parameters to simulate the daily inundation pattern at a 30‐m resolution. The model's excellent predictive power (as indicated by the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve: AUC ROC at 0.915) engendered confidence for its further application in floodplain ecohydrology (Shaeri Karimi, Saintilan, Wen, Cox, & Valavi, 2021; Shaeri Karimi, Saintilan, Wen, Valavi, & Cox, 2021).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…E. camaldulensis was found to favour areas with a longer duration of inundation and shorter period of years without flooding. In contrast, E. largiflorens has been shown to prefer a shorter inundation duration with a more extended interflood period, while E. coolabah and D. florulenta have demonstrated the ability to adapt to a wider range of inundation duration (Shaeri Karimi, Saintilan, Wen, Cox, & Valavi, 2021).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Spatio‐temporal effects of inundation and climate on vegetation greenness dynamics in dryland floodplains

et al. 2021

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Monitoring floodplain vegetation response to water availability is essential for sustainable water resource management. However, the interpretation of these responses through space and time has been challenging due to the limitation of satellite-derived inundation extent, which is restricted by the return period of imagery and prevalence of clouds affected images during high flow events. We address this issue by utilising a predictive inundation model capable of reporting inundation at daily temporal resolution. Spatio-temporal patterns in vegetation greenness of four floodplain vegetation communities (Eucalyptus camaldulensis, Eucalyptus largiflorens, Eucalyptus coolabah and Duma florulenta) were quantified using Landsat-derived vegetation index and a combination of time series of floodplain inundation pattern, rainfall and soil moisture for the years 1989-2016. The results show that vegetation dynamics were highly variable between years and are closely associated with irregular rainfall patterns and overbank flooding. Linear mixed-effect models explained between 38% and 67% of the variability in vegetation productivity, with all involved variables being significant predictors (p < 0.05). The effects of rainfall, soil moisture and inundation were diverse and depended on vegetation type. Higher inundation frequency and low interflood period often corresponded to lower vegetation responses, which may relate to a mixed surface water and vegetation signal, or a short-term inhibitive effect of surface water on growth. These results highlight the importance of groundwater and lagged effects of rainfall and flow in explaining patterns of vegetation condition in semi-arid floodplains and should be considered in the design of environmental water monitoring programmes.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Spatio‐temporal effects of inundation and climate on vegetation greenness dynamics in dryland floodplains

et al. 2021

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“…In common with many Eucalyptus species, the river red gum Eucalyptus camaldulensis sheds its leaves to reduce transpiration as an adaptation to drought and water stress, but recovers its canopy rapidly by epicormic growth following improvement in soil moisture conditions (Cunningham et al 2007;Doody et al 2015;Souter 2019), as evident during and following the Millennium Drought (Colloff and Baldwin 2010;Wen et al 2012;Wen and Saintilan 2015;Curtis et al 2019). The species can survive decadal-long periods between inundation (Colloff 2014;Doody et al 2015;Shaeri Karimi et al 2021), although with greatly reduced canopy cover. Long-term mapping of some of the most extensive E. camaldulensis forests (the Barmah-Millewa Forest and the Macquarie Marshes) using historical aerial photography suggests a substantial increase in extent at the expense of wetland grassland communities over recent decades.…”

Section: Observations Of Forested Wetland Resilience and Expansionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Australian forested wetlands under climate change: collapse or proliferation?

Saintilan

Asbridge

Lucas

et al. 2021

Mar. Freshwater Res.

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Climatically driven perturbations (e.g. intense drought, fire, sea surface temperature rise) can bring ecosystems that are already stressed by long-term climate change and other anthropogenic impacts to a point of collapse. Recent reviews of the responses of Australian ecosystems to climate change and associated stressors have suggested widespread ecosystem collapse is occurring across multiple biomes. Two commonly cited case studies concern forested wetland ecosystems: mangrove forest dieback in northern Australia (2015–16) and riverine forest dieback in the south-east of the continent (2002–09). We present an alternative interpretation that emphasises the dominant signal of climate change effects, rather than the interdecadal signal of climate variability that drives wetland forest dynamics. For both the south-east Australian riverine forests and mangroves of northern Australia, aerial extent remains greater after dieback than in the early 1990s. We interpret dieback and defoliation in both systems as a dry phase response and provide evidence of a current and near-future climate change trajectory of increased areal extent and cover (i.e. tree colonisation and range infilling). In both case studies, climate change-driven increases in tree cover and extent are occurring at the expense of wetland grasslands and the important ecosystem functions they support.

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Quantifying floodplain heterogeneity with field observation, remote sensing, and landscape ecology: Methods and metrics

Iskin

Wohl

2023

River Research & Apps

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Floodplains provide numerous ecosystem services that depend on the spatial heterogeneity, or patchiness, of the floodplain. Direct and indirect human alterations of rivers can reduce floodplain heterogeneity and function, but relatively little is known of patterns of floodplain heterogeneity in natural, fully functional floodplains. We quantify floodplain heterogeneity at four sites in the United States with the objectives of (i) developing a method of combining field measurements and remote sensing data products to calculate integrative landscape-scale metrics of floodplain spatial heterogeneity and (ii) demonstrating which metrics from landscape ecology are likely to be useful for identifying qualities of natural floodplains, differentiating floodplains, and inferring processes, based on a case study of three prairie floodplains and one beaver-modified floodplain in the continental United States. We developed a new unsupervised classification workflow that combines field data, topography, and Sentinel-2A imagery to create classified floodplains for all four field sites that could be used to calculate heterogeneity metrics.We identified six heterogeneity metrics for characterizing natural floodplain heterogeneity: aggregation index, interspersion and juxtaposition index, largest patch index, patch density, percentage of like adjacencies, and Shannon's evenness index, and these metrics capture both intermetric (variation in spatial heterogeneity between the floodplains) and intrametric variation (variation in the patterns of the metrics). Results show that natural floodplains have high evenness and interspersion and juxtaposition of classes, and we attribute this to natural flow and sediment regimes driving channel migration, erosion, deposition, vegetation succession, and active beaver modifications. Colorado floodplains show higher aggregation and lower fragmentation than the Oklahoma floodplain. We attribute this to the greater incision and lower hydrologic variability at the Oklahoma site.

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Influence of inundation characteristics on the distribution of dryland floodplain vegetation communities

Cited by 6 publications

References 44 publications

Spatio‐temporal effects of inundation and climate on vegetation greenness dynamics in dryland floodplains

Spatio‐temporal effects of inundation and climate on vegetation greenness dynamics in dryland floodplains

Australian forested wetlands under climate change: collapse or proliferation?

Quantifying floodplain heterogeneity with field observation, remote sensing, and landscape ecology: Methods and metrics

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