Initial site conditions and interactions between multiple drivers determine herb-layer changes over five decades in temperate forests

Naaf, Tobias; Kolk, Jens

doi:10.1016/j.foreco.2016.01.041

Cited by 32 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…Environmental changes such as shifts in land use, eutrophication, and climate change all influence forest vegetation (Gilliam 2016, Hedwall and Brunet 2016, Naaf and Kolk 2016. Modern intensive forestry has greatly altered landscape dynamics and ecosystem functions (Gilliam 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Climate change, wildfire suppression, ungulate overabundance, drainage, and introduction of exotic species may also all contribute to vegetation changes in forests (Gilliam 2016). The importance and roles of these drivers, and their interactions, depend on factors such as the current forest management system (Chaudhary et al 2016), former forest use (Vellend et al 2007), and site conditions (Naaf and Kolk 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Half a century of multiple anthropogenic stressors has altered northern forest understory plant communities

Hedwall

Gustafsson

Brunet

et al. 2019

Ecological Applications

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Boreal forests form the largest and least disturbed forest biome in the northern hemisphere. However, anthropogenic pressure from intensified forest management, eutrophication, and climate change may alter the ecosystem functions of understory vegetation and services boreal forests provide. Swedish forests span long gradients of climate, nitrogen deposition, and management intensity. This makes them ideal to study how the species composition and functions of other, more pristine, boreal forests might change under increased anthropogenic pressure. Moreover, the National Forest Inventory (NFI) has collected systematic data on Swedish forest vegetation since the mid‐20th century. We use this data to quantify changes in vegetation types between two periods, 1953–1962 and 2003–2012. The results show changes in forest understory vegetation since the 1950s at scales not previously documented in the boreal biome. The spatial extent of most vegetation types changed significantly. Shade‐adapted and nutrient‐demanding species (those with high specific leaf area) have become more common at the expense of light‐demanding and nutrient‐conservative (low specific leaf area) species. The cover of ericaceous dwarf shrubs decreased dramatically. These effects were strongest where anthropogenic impacts were greatest, suggesting links to drivers such as nitrogen deposition and land‐use change. These changes may impact ecosystem functions and services via effects on higher trophic levels and faster plant litter decomposition in the expanding vegetation types. This, in turn, may influence nutrient dynamics, and consequently ecosystem productivity and carbon sequestration.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Half a century of multiple anthropogenic stressors has altered northern forest understory plant communities

Hedwall

Gustafsson

Brunet

et al. 2019

Ecological Applications

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“…Increasing soil resource availability will also favour species with higher EIV for fertility (EIV N ) (Naaf & Kolk, 2016). We might also expect no relationship between seed mass and changing resource conditions (Fortunel et al, 2009), and a unimodal response for species richness (Fraser et al, 2015).…”

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confidence: 99%

Global environmental change effects on plant community composition trajectories depend upon management legacies

Perring

Bernhardt‐Römermann

Baeten

et al. 2018

Global Change Biology

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112

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The contemporary state of functional traits and species richness in plant communities depends on legacy effects of past disturbances. Whether temporal responses of community properties to current environmental changes are altered by such legacies is, however, unknown. We expect global environmental changes to interact with land-use legacies given different community trajectories initiated by prior management, and subsequent responses to altered resources and conditions. We tested this expectation for species richness and functional traits using 1814 survey-resurvey plot pairs of understorey communities from 40 European temperate forest datasets, syntheses of management transitions since the year 1800, and a trait database. We also examined how plant community indicators of resources and conditions changed in response to management legacies and environmental change. Community trajectories were clearly influenced by interactions between management legacies from over 200 years ago and environmental change. Importantly, higher rates of nitrogen deposition led to increased species richness and plant height in forests managed less intensively in 1800 (i.e., high forests), and to decreases in forests with a more intensive historical management in 1800 (i.e., coppiced forests). There was evidence that these declines in community variables in formerly coppiced forests were ameliorated by increased rates of temperature change between surveys. Responses were generally apparent regardless of sites' contemporary management classifications, although sometimes the management transition itself, rather than historic or contemporary management types, better explained understorey responses. Main effects of environmental change were rare, although higher rates of precipitation change increased plant height, accompanied by increases in fertility indicator values. Analysis of indicator values suggested the importance of directly characterising resources and conditions to better understand legacy and environmental change effects. Accounting for legacies of past disturbance can reconcile contradictory literature results and appears crucial to anticipating future responses to global environmental change.

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“…Our findings could be extrapolated to a large number of regions where environmental filtering is a poor determinant of plant distributions or where environmental conditions do not differ between recent and ancient forests (Brunet et al., ; De Frenne et al., ; Vellend et al., ; Verheyen, Fastenaekels, Vellend, De Keersmaeker, & Hermy, ; Verheyen et al., ). For species that are strongly limited by abiotic filtering, we could hypothesize that: (1) the convergence never occurs due to strong differences in abiotic conditions between ancient and post‐agricultural forests (Jacquemyn, Butaye, & Hermy, ; Rogers et al., ; Vellend, ), or (2) the convergence arises due to an homogenization of abiotic conditions over time (Baeten & Verheyen, ; Matlack, ; Naaf & Kolk, ). Investigating these hypotheses remains challenging.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Projected regional forest plant community dynamics evidence centuries‐long effects of habitat turnover

Lalechère

Jabot

Archaux³

et al. 2018

J Vegetation Science

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Questions Many Western European and North American countries have been experiencing strong reforestation in the last two centuries due to agricultural abandonment. Other land‐use changes, such as urbanization, can simultaneously trigger forest erosion. In this context of habitat turnover, forest understorey plant dynamics depend on the balance between immigration credit in post‐agricultural forest and extinction debt in ancient forest. The transient and final community properties following concomitant habitat creation and destruction are poorly known. In this contribution, we study the projected transient regional forest plant dynamics and identify the determinants of the relaxation duration at both landscape and patch scales. Location Seine‐et‐Marne region, France. Methods Species’ incidences are projected in 9,208 patches of the Seine‐et‐Marne region characterized by strong development of post‐agricultural forests and a moderate erosion of ancient forests during the period 1840–2000. We use a metapopulation model with static biodiversity data and landscape history to project forest plant dynamics. We focus on 33 generalist forest species that are able to colonize both ancient and post‐agricultural forests. Results Our analyses reveal that (1) extinction in ancient forests slows the colonization process, which lasts between 250 and 990 years after habitat turnover, depending on species characteristics; (2) the species incidence in post‐agricultural forests converges towards that in ancient forests long before the overall species incidence stabilizes at the landscape scale (i.e. long before the relaxation time); (3) landscape‐ and patch‐scale relaxation times depend on species colonization ability and patch functional connectivity; (4) the colonization process is rather slow for ancient forest species; and (5) the incidence of ancient forest species becomes larger than the incidence of other species at the end of the colonization dynamics thanks to their strong persistence. Conclusions Ancient forest species may potentially benefit from a large immigration credit but need centuries to use it. On such time scales, many perturbations are likely to jeopardize the realization of this potential credit.

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Initial site conditions and interactions between multiple drivers determine herb-layer changes over five decades in temperate forests

Cited by 32 publications

References 61 publications

Half a century of multiple anthropogenic stressors has altered northern forest understory plant communities

Half a century of multiple anthropogenic stressors has altered northern forest understory plant communities

Global environmental change effects on plant community composition trajectories depend upon management legacies

Projected regional forest plant community dynamics evidence centuries‐long effects of habitat turnover

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