A century of ecosystem change: human and seabird impacts on plant species extirpation and invasion on islands

Abstract

We used 116-years of floral and faunal records from Mandarte Island, British Columbia, Canada, to estimate the indirect effects of humans on plant communities via their effects on the population size of a surface-nesting, colonial seabird, the Glaucous-winged gull (Larus glaucescens). Comparing current to historical records revealed 18 extirpations of native plant species (32% of species historically present), 31 exotic species introductions, and one case of exotic introduction followed by extirpation. Contemporary surveys indicated that native species cover declined dramatically from 1986 to 2006, coincident with the extirpation of 'old-growth' conifers. Because vegetation change co-occurred with an increasing gull population locally and regionally, we also tested predictions from the hypothesis that the presence and activities of seabirds help to explain those changes.Specifically, we predicted we would observe high nutrient loading and exotic plant species richness and cover on nearby islands with versus without gull colonies as a consequence of competitive dominance in species adapted to high soil nitrogen and trampling. As predicted, we found that native plant species cover and richness were lower, and exotic species cover and richness higher, on islands with versus without gull colonies. In addition, we found that soil carbon and nitrogen on islands with nesting gulls were positively related to soil depth and exotic species richness and cover across plots and islands. Our results suggest that gulls have the potential to drive rapid change in insular plant communities by increasing nutrients and disturbing vegetation. Because human activities have contributed to long-term change in gull populations, our results further suggest compelling, indirect links between human management decisions and plant community composition on islands of the Georgia Basin. Collins & Armesto, 1987;Strayer et al., 2006) but rarely studied over multiple decades (Bakker et al., 49 1996). Comparing contemporary and historical surveys can help rectify this deficit and enhance 50 understanding of long-term ecological change (Macdougall & Turkington, 2005; Arcese et al., 2014; 51 McKechnie et al., 2014). In particular, human disturbance and habitat conversion via exotic species 52 invasion are both identified as drivers of plant community change (Davis, Grime & Thompson, 2000; 53 Macdougall & Turkington, 2005;Seabloom et al., 2006), with recent evidence indicating that human 54 impacts can arise indirectly via predator removal or herbivore introductions that facilitate trophic 55 cascades, particularly in island systems (Estes et al., 2011; Arcese et al., 2014). Observational results 56 further suggest that humans can affect island plant communities via their impacts on island-nesting 57 seabirds, including via predator introduction, changes in harvest rate, the provision of anthropogenic 58 foods or depletion of native prey species (Croll et al., 2005;Mulder et al., 2011; Baumberger et al., 2012). 59 These activities can in...

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