Glacial-relict symptoms in the Western Carpathian flora

Dítě, Daniel; Hájek, Michal; Svitková, Ivana; Košuthová, Alica; Šoltés, R.; Kliment, Ján

doi:10.1007/s12224-018-9321-8

Cited by 47 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 99 publications

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“…Rich and calcareous fens act as important biodiversity hotspots. Many species considered as a relict from late glacial and Early Holocene times occur here [351][352][353], and they are significantly associated with old fens initiating before the Middle Holocene [354]. Such fens are richer in plant specialists than younger ones, and when they are large enough, also in snail species [355].…”

Section: Mires (Peatlands): Fens and Bogsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characteristics, Main Impacts, and Stewardship of Natural and Artificial Freshwater Environments: Consequences for Biodiversity Conservation

Cantonati

Poikāne

Pringle

et al. 2020

Water

164

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In this overview (introductory article to a special issue including 14 papers), we consider all main types of natural and artificial inland freshwater habitas (fwh). For each type, we identify the main biodiversity patterns and ecological features, human impacts on the system and environmental issues, and discuss ways to use this information to improve stewardship. Examples of selected key biodiversity/ecological features (habitat type): narrow endemics, sensitive (groundwater and GDEs); crenobionts, LIHRes (springs); unidirectional flow, nutrient spiraling (streams); naturally turbid, floodplains, large-bodied species (large rivers); depth-variation in benthic communities (lakes); endemism and diversity (ancient lakes); threatened, sensitive species (oxbow lakes, SWE); diverse, reduced littoral (reservoirs); cold-adapted species (Boreal and Arctic fwh); endemism, depauperate (Antarctic fwh); flood pulse, intermittent wetlands, biggest river basins (tropical fwh); variable hydrologic regime—periods of drying, flash floods (arid-climate fwh). Selected impacts: eutrophication and other pollution, hydrologic modifications, overexploitation, habitat destruction, invasive species, salinization. Climate change is a threat multiplier, and it is important to quantify resistance, resilience, and recovery to assess the strategic role of the different types of freshwater ecosystems and their value for biodiversity conservation. Effective conservation solutions are dependent on an understanding of connectivity between different freshwater ecosystems (including related terrestrial, coastal and marine systems).

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Section: Mires (Peatlands): Fens and Bogsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characteristics, Main Impacts, and Stewardship of Natural and Artificial Freshwater Environments: Consequences for Biodiversity Conservation

Cantonati

Poikāne

Pringle

et al. 2020

Water

164

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“…Veratrum nigrum, Crepis sibirica, Pseudolysimachion spurium, Serratula lycopifolia). Currently they frequently occur in meadow steppes in the forest-steppe zone in Eurasia (Erdős et al 2018) and may hence represent relicts of Early Holocene forest-steppe communities (Hájková et al 2011, Roleček et al 2014, Dítě et al 2018. Their occurrence hence provides an indication of continual existence of forest-steppe throughout the Holocene (Sillinger 1929, Hájková et al 2011.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil moisture and a legacy of prehistoric human activities have contributed to the extraordinary plant species diversity of grasslands in the White Carpathians

Fajmonová¹,

Hájková²,

Hájek³

2020

Preslia

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Soil moisture and a legacy of prehistoric human activities have contributed to the extraordinary plant species diversity of grasslands in the White Carpathians. -Preslia 92: The factors that determine the unique species richness and composition of some temperate grasslands are poorly known. Uniqueness of the extraordinarily species-rich grasslands in the White Carpathian mountain range (Czech Republic, Slovakia), with many disjunct occurrences of species, have been previously attributed to intermittently wet deep soils, which facilitate the co-occurrence of steppe and wet-grassland species, and Holocene continuity of open land, resulted in large species pools. Based on a detailed investigation of 23 well-preserved regularly mown grasslands differing in their vegetation composition and species richness, we tested the relative importance of the hypothetical determinants of compositional variability within semi-dry grasslands. For the first time we included measurements of seasonal moisture at different soil depths and landscape differences in the intensity of the effect of prehistoric humans. Soil moisture was measured using the frequencydomain reflectometry based Profile Probe PR2 sensor at depths of 10, 20, 30, 40 and 60 cm in the soil, repeatedly every four weeks from April to November. Soil samples were taken from the same depths in order to determine soil basicity and nutrient content. As a proxy of the intensity of the effect of prehistoric human activities, mean distances between sampled localities and the five nearest Neolithic or Aeneolithic settlements were used. The species richness was best explained by mean soil moisture, which increased towards the most species-rich grasslands, whereas the distance from prehistoric settlements had no effect. Basicity, moisture and the distance from prehistoric settlements had significant conditional effects on species composition. There was a high frequency of species of intermittently wet soils, thermophilous oak forests and forest fringes in the most valuable grasslands, which are located mostly in the south-western part of the area where the soils were moister and closer to prehistoric settlements, but the seasonal variation in moisture was not high. We conclude that coexistence of species from different habitats is dependent on regular management and high soil moisture throughout the growing season. Due to intermediate moisture conditions that are tolerated by multiple ecological groups of species, many species may locally coexist and form a species-rich grassland community of unique species composition. In addition, prehistoric human activities contributed to landscape openness and helped maintain a forest-steppe species pool during the Holocene forest optimum. Our results indicate that although this historical determinant shapes predominantly the species composition pattern, the extraordinarily species-rich spots are determined rather by abiotic factors, such as intermediate moisture and biotic interactions resulting from the type and duration of management pra...

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“…Particularly in Western Europe, the role of large herbivores for the persistence of grassland diversity has been debated since the influential book of Vera (). When Central‐European vegetation scientists aim at interpreting current patterns in species distribution or richness, they often consider both the putative northern glacial microrefugia of forest species (Willner et al, ) and the Holocene refugia of grassland or taiga species (Dítě et al, ; Novák, Sádlo, & Svobodová‐Svitavská, ; Poschlod & WallisDeVries, ; Roleček et al, ). Our study demonstrates that all these refugia indeed matter and seem to play leading roles in shaping current species richness patterns.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Holocene matters: Landscape history accounts for current species richness of vascular plants in forests and grasslands of eastern Central Europe

Divíšek

Hájek

Jamrichová

et al. 2020

Journal of Biogeography

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Aim Current species‐richness patterns are sometimes interpreted as a legacy of landscape history, but historical processes shaping the distribution of species during the Holocene are frequently omitted in biodiversity models. Here, we test their importance in modelling current species richness of vascular plants in forest and grassland vegetation. Location Western Carpathians and adjacent regions. Taxon Vascular plants. Methods Numbers of all species and of habitat specialists were extracted from plot records of forest and grassland vegetation. For each plot, environmental and historical data were derived from thematic maps. Historical data related to the persistence of (a) temperate taxa during the Late Glacial and Early Holocene, (b) open‐landscape taxa during the Middle Holocene and (c) taiga taxa during the Late Holocene were based on 112 fossil pollen profiles. Boosted regression trees were used to model spatial patterns in species richness. Results Historical variables always appeared among the best predictors of current species richness. In light forests, species richness highly mirrored both the Late Glacial (12.5% contribution) and Middle‐Holocene (8.6%) landscape history. The latter factor became an important predictor also for species richness of steppe grasslands (8.3%) along with temperature seasonality (11.9%). Species richness of dark coniferous forests was best predicted by the Late‐Holocene occurrence of taiga forests (14.8%), which had an even stronger effect on the richness of habitat specialists (20.5%). Main conclusions Landscape changes since the Last Glacial Maximum are important predictors of current plant species richness. The historical effects were found to be habitat specific and, because they may interact with recent environmental conditions and anthropogenic pressures, they often show a nonlinear relationship with species richness. We provide one possible direction of incorporating past landscape changes to the models of species richness.

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Glacial-relict symptoms in the Western Carpathian flora

Cited by 47 publications

References 99 publications

Characteristics, Main Impacts, and Stewardship of Natural and Artificial Freshwater Environments: Consequences for Biodiversity Conservation

Characteristics, Main Impacts, and Stewardship of Natural and Artificial Freshwater Environments: Consequences for Biodiversity Conservation

Soil moisture and a legacy of prehistoric human activities have contributed to the extraordinary plant species diversity of grasslands in the White Carpathians

Holocene matters: Landscape history accounts for current species richness of vascular plants in forests and grasslands of eastern Central Europe

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