Fatal interactions between Scots pine and Sphagnum mosses in bog ecosystems

Abstract

2001. Fatal interactions between Scots pine and Sphagnum mosses in bog ecosystems. -Oikos 94: 425-432.In this study, we explore how Sphagnum mosses and Scots pine, Pinus syl6estris, interact on different spatial and temporal scales in a boreal bog ecosystem. We were particularly interested in relationships between the occurrence of Sphagnum-dominated habitats and the occurrence of Scots pines of different age and size. Juvenile and adult pines occurred in different habitats. While juveniles mainly occurred in Sphagnum-dominated habitats, predominantly with Sphagnum rubellum, adult pines were found in habitats dominated by lichens, or with a sparse vegetation cover. Examination of surface peat cores sampled close to adult pines revealed that almost all pines (97%) had established in a Sphagnum-dominated environment and that the habitat had changed since pine establishment. Scots pine is thus capable of changing and exterminating the Sphagnum-dominated environment preferred for germination and establishment. Pines impede Sphagnum growth and peat accumulation significantly once they have reached a stem diameter of approximately 20 mm. It takes from 30 to 90 yr for a pine to reach that size. Our results show the importance of interactions between Scots pine and Sphagnum mosses in bog ecosystems. We conclude that interactions between trees and Sphagnum mosses are important driving forces behind the vegetation change that has characterised boreal bogs during the Holocene.

Growth, production and interspecific competition in Sphagnum: effects of temperature, nitrogen and sulphur treatments on a boreal mire

“…data). Both the establishment of new vascular plant seedlings (Ohlson et al, 2001) and their nutrient acquisition (Malmer et al, 1994;Heijmans et al, 2002b) may increase, resulting in increased vascular plant biomass production (Heijmans et al, 2002a;Weltzin et al, 2001;Limpens et al, 2003;Tomassen et al, 2003). Since the competition for light (in this study between mosses and higher plants) is asymmetric, the change in dominance from Sphagnum to vascular plants may be a relatively fast process.…”

The colonization history of Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) in pristine and drained raised bogs in Latvia

“…~6400 km 2 (Pakalne 2008). The development of tree cover has been observed in many ombrotrophic bogs in Latvia during the last century, as has been documented elsewhere in Northern Europe (Linderholm 1999;Ohlson et al 2001;Linderholm, Leine 2004), Central Europe (Frelechoux et al 2000a;Frelechoux et al 2000b;Frelechoux et al 2003;Obidzinski et al 2009), and Canada (Pellerin, Lavoie 2003). As a result of overgrowing, the habitats and plant and animal species typical for raised bogs disappear and the growth and deposition of Sphagnum mosses is reduced, and these factors, in turn, affect the accumulation of carbon in mire ecosystems (Ohlson et al 2001).…”

Nutrients and Hydrology Indicate the Driving Mechanisms of Peatland Surface Patterning

“…Fourth, following Hilbert et al (2000) and Rietkerk et al (2004a), we considered only one functional plant group. Competition between functional plant groups can be important (Van Breemen 1995;Ohlson et al 2001), and the species composition affects peat decomposability (Moore et al 2007) and carbon sequestration rates (Belyea and Malmer 2004), but interactions between functional plant groups are beyond the scope of this study. How competition between different functional plant groups may affect pattern formation is treated in detail elsewhere (Eppinga et al 2009).…”