Vascular plant abundance and diversity in an alpine heath under observed and simulated global change

Global change is predicted to cause shifts in species distributions and biodiversity in arctic tundra. We applied factorial warming and nutrient manipulation to a nutrient and species poor alpine/arctic heath community for seven years. Vascular plant abundance in control plots increased by 31%. Ther...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Scientific reports 2015-05, Vol.5 (1), p.10197-10197, Article 10197
Main Authors: Alatalo, Juha M., Little, Chelsea J., Jägerbrand, Annika K., Molau, Ulf
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
631/158/670
704/158/2165
Abundance
ALASKAN ARCTIC TUNDRA
Arctic Regions
Biodiversity
CHANGE
CLIMATE-CHANGE
COMMUNITY RESPONSES
DEPOSITION
Ecology
Ecosystem
Ekologi
Environmental impact
ENVIRONMENTAL-CHANGE
Grasses
Humanities and Social Sciences
MOUNTAIN SUMMITS
multidisciplinary
Multidisciplinary Sciences
NITROGEN
Nutrients
Plant communities
Plant diversity
Plants
Population decline
Population Density
Science
Shrubs
Species diversity
SPECIES RICHNESS
TERM RESPONSES
TERRESTRIAL ECOSYSTEMS
Threatened species
Tundra
U Science
VEGETATION
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Summary:Global change is predicted to cause shifts in species distributions and biodiversity in arctic tundra. We applied factorial warming and nutrient manipulation to a nutrient and species poor alpine/arctic heath community for seven years. Vascular plant abundance in control plots increased by 31%. There were also notable changes in cover in the nutrient and combined nutrient and warming treatments, with deciduous and evergreen shrubs declining, grasses overgrowing these plots. Sedge abundance initially increased significantly with nutrient amendment and then declined, going below initial values in the combined nutrient and warming treatment. Nutrient addition resulted in a change in dominance hierarchy from deciduous shrubs to grasses. We found significant declines in vascular plant diversity and evenness in the warming treatment and a decline in diversity in the combined warming and nutrient addition treatment, while nutrient addition caused a decline in species richness. The results give some experimental support that species poor plant communities with low diversity may be more vulnerable to loss of species diversity than communities with higher initial diversity. The projected increase in nutrient deposition and warming may therefore have negative impacts on ecosystem processes, functioning and services due to loss of species diversity in an already impoverished environment.
ISSN:2045-2322
2045-2322
DOI:10.1038/srep10197