Red-deer dung increases species diversity but does not influence species composition of open grasslands

IF 2.2 3区环境科学与生态学 Q2 ECOLOGY Journal of Vegetation Science Pub Date : 2024-06-25 DOI:10.1111/jvs.13283

Barbora Lepková, Eva Horčičková, Tomáš Herben

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Abstract

Questions

Free-ranging herbivores are often seen as important endozoochorous dispersal vectors for plant propagules. Dispersal by free-ranging animals, in contrast to domestic animals, and its effects on vegetation have rarely been studied. We ask what are the effects of deposition of dung on open landscape vegetation, how does it influence vegetation development after disturbance by soil removal, and does it change species richness or composition?

Location

The Doupov Mountains, Czech Republic.

Methods

We established a six-year experiment in 2015 to study the effects of dung deposition on vegetation of an open grassland landscape. The experiment comprised 300 plots distributed across five fenced site locations and treatments were implemented in partially crossed design, with soil removed (disturbance) and dung pellets deposited; treatments were applied once to five replicates, from June to October 2015. We recorded plant species cover at the beginning of the vegetation seasons of 2016, 2017 and 2021.

Results

Dung deposition increased species richness and Ellenberg Indicator Values for nutrients, and these effects were stronger in disturbed plots; however, these effects diminished with time. There were no effects of dung deposition on species composition. In contrast, disturbance affected species diversity, composition, Ellenberg Indicator Values for nutrients, proportion of dung-dispersed species, but not species richness. Surprisingly, there were no effects of timing of dung deposition.

Conclusions

Our results indicate that endozoochorous seed dispersal by red deer impacts vegetation dynamics of this open grassland landscape, but effects are weak and diminish with time. Considering the large seed load in dung, it is possible that endozoochorous seeds from wild herbivores are incorporated into the soil seed bank, where they persist until appropriate ecological conditions for germination arise.

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红鹿粪便可增加物种多样性，但不会影响开阔草地的物种构成

问题自由放养的食草动物通常被视为植物繁殖体的重要内吸传播媒介。与家养动物相比，散放动物的传播及其对植被的影响很少被研究。我们的问题是：粪便沉积对开阔地植被有哪些影响？在土壤被移除造成干扰后，粪便如何影响植被的发展？地点捷克共和国杜波夫山脉。方法我们于 2015 年开展了一项为期六年的实验，研究粪便沉积对开阔草地植被的影响。实验由分布在五个围栏地点的 300 个地块组成，采用部分交叉设计实施处理，清除土壤（干扰）并沉积粪便颗粒；2015 年 6 月至 10 月期间，在五个重复中施用一次处理。我们在 2016 年、2017 年和 2021 年植被季节开始时记录了植物物种覆盖率。结果粪便沉积增加了物种丰富度和养分的艾伦伯格指标值，这些影响在受干扰的地块中更为强烈；然而，随着时间的推移，这些影响逐渐减弱。粪便沉积对物种组成没有影响。相反，干扰会影响物种多样性、物种组成、艾伦伯格营养指标值、粪便散布物种的比例，但不会影响物种丰富度。令人惊讶的是，粪便堆放的时间没有影响。结论我们的研究结果表明，赤鹿的内吸式种子散播会影响这片开阔草地的植被动态，但影响较弱，且随着时间的推移会逐渐减弱。考虑到粪便中含有大量种子，野生食草动物的内吸性种子有可能被纳入土壤种子库中，并在那里一直存活到适合发芽的生态条件出现为止。

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来源期刊

Journal of Vegetation Science 环境科学-林学

CiteScore

6.00

自引率

3.60%

发文量

审稿时长

2 months

期刊介绍： The Journal of Vegetation Science publishes papers on all aspects of plant community ecology, with particular emphasis on papers that develop new concepts or methods, test theory, identify general patterns, or that are otherwise likely to interest a broad international readership. Papers may focus on any aspect of vegetation science, e.g. community structure (including community assembly and plant functional types), biodiversity (including species richness and composition), spatial patterns (including plant geography and landscape ecology), temporal changes (including demography, community dynamics and palaeoecology) and processes (including ecophysiology), provided the focus is on increasing our understanding of plant communities. The Journal publishes papers on the ecology of a single species only if it plays a key role in structuring plant communities. Papers that apply ecological concepts, theories and methods to the vegetation management, conservation and restoration, and papers on vegetation survey should be directed to our associate journal, Applied Vegetation Science journal.