Twelve years of repeated wild hog activity promotes population maintenance of an invasive clonal plant in a coastal dune ecosystem

Abstract

Invasive animals can facilitate the success of invasive plant populations through disturbance. We examined the relationship between the repeated foraging disturbance of an invasive animal and the population maintenance of an invasive plant in a coastal dune ecosystem. We hypothesized that feral wild hog (Sus scrofa) populations repeatedly utilized tubers of the clonal perennial, yellow nutsedge (Cyperus esculentus) as a food source and evaluated whether hog activity promoted the long‐term maintenance of yellow nutsedge populations on St. Catherine's Island, Georgia, United States. Using generalized linear mixed models, we tested the effect of wild hog disturbance on permanent sites for yellow nutsedge culm density, tuber density, and percent cover of native plant species over a 12‐year period. We found that disturbance plots had a higher number of culms and tubers and a lower percentage of native live plant cover than undisturbed control plots. Wild hogs redisturbed the disturbed plots approximately every 5 years. Our research provides demographic evidence that repeated foraging disturbances by an invasive animal promote the long‐term population maintenance of an invasive clonal plant. Opportunistic facultative interactions such as we demonstrate in this study are likely to become more commonplace as greater numbers of introduced species are integrated into ecological communities around the world.

Wild boar (Sus scrofa) increases species diversity of semidry grassland: Field experiment with simulated soil disturbances

“…Wild boar rooting has often been linked with promotion of invasive plants (Bankovich et al, ; Oldfield & Evans, ). Our study did not directly address this topic.…”

“…Free-ranging boars are thus seen as an economic risk to agricultural systems (Bankovich, Boughton, Boughton, Avery, & Wisely, 2016;Campbell & Long, 2009) as well as a threat to diversity in valuable natural communities (Felix, Orzell, Tillman, Engeman, & Avery, 2014). Especially on islands with no historic native ungulate fauna, introduction of wild boars has been shown to cause decline of native species and support plant invasions (Aplet, Anderson, & Stone, 1991;Oldfield & Evans, 2016); however, there are also examples of boar rooting that has not resulted in negative vegetation responses (Baron, 1982).…”

Invasive Wild Pigs: A Significant Disturbance in Coastal Forests

“…The impacts of rooting on soil dynamics also contribute to the establishment and success of non-native plants [69,78,79]. Repeated disturbance to vegetation and soil dynamics by wild pigs can facilitate the long-term dominance of invasive plant species [80]. The results of this type of long-term dominance vary by habitat and condition type, but evidence suggests that these types of invasions can lead to significant shifts in ecosystem dynamics and function as it alters existing ecosystem interactions, such as mutualistic interactions [81][82][83][84].…”

A Global Systematic Review on Biology, Production Constraints and Uses of <em>Cyperus exculentus</em> L. (Neglected and Underutilized Crop Species): Implications for Valorization.

“…Tigernut species is an annual or perennial plant, growing to 90 cm tall, with solitary stems growing from a tuber. The tigernut plant species is reproduced in three ways: by seeds, by creeping rhizomes, and by tubers [32][33][34]. The first tigernut leaves are linear, with a sharp wedge at the top, 2 to 10 cm long and 4 mm wide.…”