Browsing by Subject "ecosystem function"

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
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    Forests and Biodiversity cleaned biomass survey data 2013-2018
    (2021-02-12) Kothari, Shan; Montgomery, Rebecca A; Cavender-Bares, Jeannine; kotha020@umn.edu; Kothari, Shan; University of Minnesota Cavender-Bares Lab; University of Minnesota Montgomery Lab; Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve
    This dataset includes annual growth survey measurements from the Forests and Biodiversity 1 (e271) experiment at Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve in East Bethel, MN. The dataset also includes a script that allows users to reproduce the figures and statistics reported in the cited paper. This version of the dataset is specifically meant to support the inferences in that paper, rather than serving as the version of record. Please consult the Cedar Creek Data Catalog (https://www.cedarcreek.umn.edu/research/data) to find the authoritative version to be used for general purposes.
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    Resident plant diversity and introduced earthworms have contrasting effects on the success of invasive plants
    (Springer International Publishing, 2014) Whitfeld, Timothy J S; Roth, Alexander M; Lodge, Alexandra G; Eisenhauer, Nico; Frelich, Lee E; Reich, Peter B
    Theoretical predictions and empirical studies suggest that resident species diversity is an important driver of community invasibility. Through trait-based processes, plants in communities with high resident species diversity occupy a wider range of ecological niches and are more productive than low diversity communities, potentially reducing the opportunities for invasion through niche preemption. In terrestrial plant communities, biotic ecosystem engineers such as earthworms can also affect invasibility by reducing leaf litter stocks and influencing soil conditions. In a greenhouse experiment, we simultaneously manipulated resident species diversity and earthworm presence to investigate independent and interactive effects of these two variables on the success of several invasive plants. Higher diversity of resident species was associated with lower biomass of invasives, with the effect mediated through resident species biomass. The presence of earthworms had a strong positive effect on the biomass of invasive species across all levels of resident species diversity and a weaker indirect negative effect via decreased soil moisture. Earthworms also weakened the positive correlation between resident species diversity and productivity. We did not observe any interactive effects of resident species biomass and earthworms on invasive species success. Partitioning the net biodiversity effect indicated that selection effects increased with resident species diversity whereas complementarity effects did not. Results suggest that managing for diverse forest communities may decrease the susceptibility of these communities to invasions. However, the presence of introduced earthworms in previously earthworm-free sites may undermine these efforts. Furthermore, future studies of plant community invasibility should account for the effects of introduced earthworms.