Open-cast mining reclamation strategies are focused on the identification of the environmental factors at different scales that facilitate the vegetation establishment and development. Here, we characterised the environmental factors at macro-scale and micro-scale that influenced the herbaceous richness and biomass accumulation patterns trough a 32-year chronosequence. Herbaceous richness and biomass were influenced at macro-scale by successional and soil development gradients whereas at micro-scale by shrub cover and coarseness gradients. Indeed, certain environmental factors at macro-scale and micro-scale contributed simultaneously to determine these gradients. Explicitly, the successional gradient was related to carbon and nitrogen ratio, grazing intensity and Shannon diversity. Across this successional gradient, total herb biomass and Fabaceae biomass were reduced as well as main taxonomical groups richness. Soil development gradient was related to total nitrogen, pH and erosion severity. This gradient only influenced species richness and produced a richness reduction when pH and erosion severity increased. At micro-scale, the shrub cover gradient was related to organic matter thickness, producing a Poaceae biomass and bryophytes cover increase when shrub cover and organic matter increased. The coarseness gradient was related to the cover of rocks and bare soil, producing a reduction of herb biomass and richness when rocks and bare soil increased. These results emphasise the need to incorporate in the management plans the influence of soil development, successional, shrub cover and coarseness gradients over herbaceous richness and biomass to improve mine reclamation strategies.
The development of species richness and plant cover through time are two important measures that are often used to assess success in land reclamation schemes. We expand this approach by considering functional groups in terms of life-history traits and dispersal strategies, as important components of ecosystem function and colonisation. Here, we test, if the species richness and cover of these functional groups are changed during post-treatment succession in 26 reclaimed coal mines, and whether these changes are related to selected soil variables (C:N, total N, and available P). Species richness showed a skewed unimodal response with time since reclamation, with a peak at 13 years. The richness of life-forms showed a clear dominance order starting with annuals, followed by perennial herbs and then woody species; whereas, when plant cover was considered, perennial herbs dominated the entire sequence. Dispersal strategies showed that anemochorous and zoochorous species were the most important groups. Soil variables were correlated with richness and cover of perennial herbs, woody species, and with anemochorous richness and zoochorous species cover. Our findings indicate that those species which respond during succession on reclaimed coal wastes are controlled in some part, by the attributes of functional groups, whereas the colonisation process is more dependent on seed sources from the local species pool than on soil properties. Our results also highlighted that the use of life-forms and dispersal strategy patterns improved the description and prediction of vegetation dynamics, and allowed us to identify successional stages better. We discussed the implication of these findings for future reclamation approaches in similar areas.
Summary Boundary structure can hinder or facilitate disturbance of the boundary vegetation by farming practices, such as herbicide and fertiliser drift and occasional cultivation; this may affect their potential role as a weed reservoir. It would be relevant for researchers, farmers and legislators to know whether relationships exist between boundary structure and weed abundance and frequency in boundaries and adjacent fields. In this study, we present a classification of arable field boundaries based on five descriptors: presence of a bank, width, percentage cover of woody and evergreen perennials (WEP), presence of a stonewall and presence of trees. Five types of boundaries are identified, ranging from structurally simple ones (flat, narrow, dominated by annual species) to structurally complex ones (presence of a bank, more than 3 m wide, dominated by WEP). Data from three Spanish regions were used to validate this classification, and the five boundary classes contained different plant communities. Structurally simple, flat and narrow boundaries contained many of the weed species found also in the field centre and with high abundance. More complex, wider boundaries with a slope and a WEP >60%, had a lower probability of hosting the main weeds present in the field centres. Assessment of weed frequency and abundance gave complementary information. The proposed classification of field boundaries may be easily used by farmers and allows adjustment of field margin management to risks posed by the field boundary, in terms of hosting common weeds of arable crops.
Arable field margins are valuable habitats providing a wide range of ecosystem services in rural landscapes. Agricultural intensification in recent decades has been a major cause of decline in plant diversity in these habitats. However, the concomitant effects on plant functional diversity are less documented, particularly in Mediterranean areas. In this paper, we analyzed the effect of margin width and surrounding landscape (cover and diversity of land use and field size), used as proxies for management intensity at local and landscape scales, on plant species richness, functional diversity and functional trait values in margins of winter cereal fields in southern Spain. Five functional traits were selected: life form, growth form, seed mass, seed dispersal mode and pollination type. RLQ and fourth-corner analyses were used to link functional traits and landscape variables. A total of 306 plant species were recorded. Species richness and functional diversity were positively related to margin width but showed no response to landscape variables. Functional trait values were affected neither by the local nor landscape variables. Our results suggest that increasing the margin width of conventionally managed cereal fields would enhance both taxonomic and functional diversity of margin plant assemblages, and thus the services they provide to the agro-ecosystem.
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