Do biogeographic parameters matter? Plant species richness and distribution of macrophytes in relation to area and isolation of ponds in NW Polish agricultural landscape

Abstract

Effects of pond size and isolation on total vascular plant species richness and number of obligate wetland species were compared. Subsequently, the potential for the presence of spatial patterns in wetland species distribution among ponds in an agricultural landscape was explored. Relationships between species richness and two main biogeographic parameters were analysed using simple and multiple linearised regression models. Spatial patterns were looked for by means of analyses carried out with the R CRAN software (join-count statistics). Simple regression analyses performed on the regional scale (n = 50) revealed the significance of the effect of pond size only (r = 0.46 for total plant species richness and r = 0.28 for wetland species richness vs. pond area). Further analyses conducted on the local scale identified the best multiple regression models in the largest pond cluster (n = 20); the models showed statistical significance of relationships between the species richness and both independent variables (r = 0.80 for total plant species richness and r = 0.70 for wetland species richness vs. pond area and isolation, including mean distance to the nearest ten ponds). Spatial analyses were performed for 26 obligate wetland species selected from 149 species recorded in all the 50 ponds. Exploratory spatial data analysis revealed the presence of significant positive spatial autocorrelation in the distribution of 8 species. In such cases, it is possible to reject the random distribution hypothesis, which justifies exploration of spatial regimes. In practice, correct spatial model specifications may have implications for predicting species occurrences under changing environmental conditions, e.g. changes in the number of ponds.

Artificial ponds in Central Europe do not fall behind the natural ponds in terms of macrophyte diversity

“…Another factor related to turbidity is higher nutrient content (Lacoul and Freedman, 2006), which probably contributed to the negative effect of turbidity on red-list species. Proximity or connection with other waterbodies positively affects species composition via dispersal of individuals between habitats (Lacoul and Freedman, 2006;Akasaka and Takamura, 2012;Bosiacka and Pieńkowski, 2012;Waldon, 2012) which was also confirmed by positive effect of connectivity on diversity of all species in natural ponds where the higher level of isolation is the more negative effect on diversity.…”

“…Signs "þ" and "À" indicate positive or negative effect on a-diversity. Variable characteristics and values are in Table 1. Hungary (Bosiacka and Pieńkowski, 2012;Szoszkiewicz et al, 2014;Lukács et al, 2015) and the rest of Europe (Oertli et al, 2002;Gledhill et al, 2008;Chappuis et al, 2012). Generally, the eastern part of Europe is known for lower macrophyte species richness (Chappuis et al, 2012) and higher species richness in Hungary or Poland could be influenced by inclusion of all observed species, not only true aquatic plants or helophytes.…”

Flood, drought and the inter-annual variation to the number and size of ponds and small wetlands in an English lowland landscape over three years of weather extremes

“…For example a, b and c diversity generally increase with pond number and density in the landscape (e.g. Thiere et al, 2009;Bosiacka & Pieńkowski, 2012) although communities can also become more similar if colonisation becomes more uniform.…”

“…Given that the area, density and clustering of ponds in single year surveys all appear to affect species richness at the local and landscape-scale (e.g. Oertli et al, 2002: Thiere et al, 2009Bosiacka & Pieńkowski, 2012), the variability between years and changes associated with local climate variation are also likely to be important but remain under-researched.…”

The Study of the Higher Aquatic Flora of the Middle Don Basin within Rostov Region

“…It includes studies of macrophytes occupying higher levels of biocenosis as well as the researches of biodiversity in general (Murphy et al, 2003;Shi et al, 2010;Chappuis et al, 2012;Bosiacka and Pienkowski, 2012;Afanasyev et al, 2012;Bolpagni et al, 2013;Lukacs et al, 2013). Aquatic flora and riparian habitats of the north of Rostov region have begun to be studied-in the middle of the XX century.…”