No precipitation legacy effects on above‐ground net primary production and species diversity in grazed Mediterranean grassland: a 21‐year experiment

Sternberg, Marcelo; Golodets, Carly; Gutman, Mario; Perevolotsky, Avi; Kigel, Jaime; Henkin, Zalmen

doi:10.1111/jvs.12478

Cited by 18 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Long-term adaptation and evolution in drought environments in Mediterranean ecosystems, however, are unique, because they combine high long-term variability in rainfall and long-term grazing pressure, which have produced a vegetation that is highly resistant to inter-annual fluctuations in growing conditions that can contribute to its persistence under projected increases in drought in Mediterranean regions [245]. This capacity to resist drought has even been demonstrated within species.…”

Section: Biodiversitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Impacts of Global Change on Mediterranean Forests and Their Services

Peñuelas

Sardans

Filella

et al. 2017

Forests

127

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The increase in aridity, mainly by decreases in precipitation but also by higher temperatures, is likely the main threat to the diversity and survival of Mediterranean forests. Changes in land use, including the abandonment of extensive crop activities, mainly in mountains and remote areas, and the increases in human settlements and demand for more resources with the resulting fragmentation of the landscape, hinder the establishment of appropriate management tools to protect Mediterranean forests and their provision of services and biodiversity. Experiments and observations indicate that if changes in climate, land use and other components of global change, such as pollution and overexploitation of resources, continue, the resilience of many forests will likely be exceeded, altering their structure and function and changing, mostly decreasing, their capacity to continue to provide their current services. A consistent assessment of the impacts of the changes, however, remains elusive due to the difficulty of obtaining simultaneous and complete data for all scales of the impacts in the same forests, areas and regions. We review the impacts of climate change and other components of global change and their interactions on the terrestrial forests of Mediterranean regions, with special attention to their impacts on ecosystem services. Management tools for counteracting the negative effects of global change on Mediterranean ecosystem- services are finally discussed.

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Section: Biodiversitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Impacts of Global Change on Mediterranean Forests and Their Services

Peñuelas

Sardans

Filella

et al. 2017

Forests

127

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“…Sternberg et al. () evaluate results from long‐term grazing experiments within the context of variability in precipitation to determine how inter‐annual precipitation legacy effects may influence plant diversity and biomass production. Finally, Byrne et al.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…() do not use the term at all, and Sternberg et al. () discuss sensitivity, but not with regard to their results. Instead, because of the nature of the responses of their systems (i.e.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…() and Sternberg et al. () focus on terms such as ‘resistant’ and ‘buffering’. This suggests that there is a body of research that implicitly deals with sensitivity by focusing on how resistant (i.e.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Mulhouse et al (2017) use long-term monitoring of plant communities to assess community dynamics in response to precipitation patterns. Sternberg et al (2017) evaluate results from long-term grazing experiments within the context of variability in precipitation to determine how inter-annual precipitation legacy effects may influence plant diversity and biomass production. Finally, Byrne et al (2017) directly manipulated precipitation amount in a short-term, multisite experiment to examine plant community responses and sensitivity.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Assessing community and ecosystem sensitivity to climate change – toward a more comparative approach

Smith

Wilcox

Power

et al. 2017

J Vegetation Science

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Plant communities can vary widely in their sensitivity to changing precipitation regimes, as reported by Byrne et al., Mulhouse et al. and Sternberg et al. in this issue of Journal of Vegetation Science. But to understand why communities differ in their sensitivity, we argue that clearly defined metrics of sensitivity and coordinated research approaches are needed to elucidate mechanisms.One of the most daunting tasks facing ecologists is the need to increase understanding of how ecological systems will respond to a changing climate. At present, we know a great deal about how climate has changed in the past, and forecasts for future change carry a high degree of confidence (IPCC 2013). However, forecasting ecological responses to these climate changes remains a challenge, in part because of differences in the sensitivity of ecological processes and systems to changing temperature and precipitation regimes (Smith et al. 2009;Dillon et al. 2010). Indeed, our understanding of how ecological systems, particularly communities and ecosystems, vary in their sensitivity to climate change and the mechanisms underlying such differential sensitivity lags far behind our ability to forecast climatic changes.In this issue, three papers report results of research designed to increase our understanding of the sensitivity of arid and semi-arid plant communities to changing precipitation regimes. The papers use very different approaches -ranging from long-term observations to short-term experiments -to address this issue. Mulhouse et al. (2017) use long-term monitoring of plant communities to assess community dynamics in response to precipitation patterns. Sternberg et al. (2017) evaluate results from long-term grazing experiments within the context of variability in precipitation to determine how inter-annual precipitation legacy effects may influence plant diversity and biomass production. Finally, Byrne et al. (2017) directly manipulated precipitation amount in a short-term, multisite experiment to examine plant community responses and sensitivity. Despite differences in approach, these three studies are linked by their conclusions that plant communities in some ecosystems are likely to be relatively insensitive to expected changes in precipitation, whereas others may be highly sensitive and respond dramatically to precipitation change.While the results of these studies -that communities are expected to differ in their sensitivity to forecast changes in precipitation -are interesting, in aggregate they are limited by the binary (resistant vs responsive) and qualitative (more vs less sensitive) nature of their conclusions. This highlights the need to quantify 'sensitivity' as (1) a continuous variable and (2) in ways that more readily allow comparisons across studies if we are to advance our understanding of how and to what extent communities and ecosystems will respond to future climate change. A 'systems' definition of sensitivity (change in output per unit change in input) may be most appropriate for ecology. Such a...

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Increased rainfall variability and nitrogen deposition accelerate succession along a common sere

et al. 2021

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Ongoing climate change is increasing rainfall variability in many parts of the world; in particular, the heaviest rainfall events are becoming heavier. In terrestrial ecosystems, nitrogen deposition is increasing as a result of emissions from fossil fuel burning and volatilization of nitrogen-based fertilizers. These changes in the timing and rate of resource inputs can impact plant communities by altering competitive dynamics, succession, and community composition. In many systems, these are occurring alongside successional dynamics, making it difficult to tease apart mechanisms. Here, we resampled a nitrogen by rainfall variability manipulation experiment in a restored tallgrass prairie to examine the relative role of background community dynamics and treatment effects on plant diversity. During the treatment period, nitrogen addition and increased rainfall variability reduced diversity. Here, four and five years after the treatments were halted, we found similarly low levels of diversity across all treatments-an effect driven by dominance of a tall, fast-growing, clonal forb, Solidago canadensis. The convergence of plots toward a low diversity state suggests that all experimental communities were gradually becoming dominated by S. canadensis, including in the absence of rainfall or nitrogen treatments. In contrast to short-term findings from the same experiment, we conclude that our treatments accelerated succession toward a tall, clonal forb-dominated community along an existing sere, but did not fundamentally alter longer-term community composition-a result that was only apparent several years after the conclusion of the experiment. These findings reinforce the need to interpret the results from short-term experimental manipulations within the context of long-term successional change.

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No precipitation legacy effects on above‐ground net primary production and species diversity in grazed Mediterranean grassland: a 21‐year experiment

Cited by 18 publications

References 38 publications

Impacts of Global Change on Mediterranean Forests and Their Services

Impacts of Global Change on Mediterranean Forests and Their Services

Assessing community and ecosystem sensitivity to climate change – toward a more comparative approach

Increased rainfall variability and nitrogen deposition accelerate succession along a common sere

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