Intense ranchland management tips the balance of regional and local factors affecting wetland community structure

Medley, Kim A.; Boughton, Elizabeth H.; Jenkins, David G.; Fauth, John E.; Bohlen, Patrick J.; Quintana‐Ascencio, Pedro F.

doi:10.1016/j.agee.2015.06.024

Cited by 19 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 53 publications

(71 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The amphibian community composition largely overlapped with the composition detected by other studies at this site (Babbitt et al. , Medley et al ). Mean amphibian abundance across wetlands was 15 ± 2.8 (SE) and ranged from 0 to 70 individuals.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 80%

Amphibian responses to livestock use of wetlands: new empirical data and a global review

Howell

Mothes

Clements

et al. 2019

Ecological Applications

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Pastureland currently occupies 26% of Earth's ice-free land surface. As the global human population continues to increase and developing countries consume more proteinrich diets, the amount of land devoted to livestock grazing will only continue to rise. To mitigate the loss of global biodiversity as a consequence of the ever-expanding amount of land converted from native habitat into pastureland for livestock grazing, an understanding of how livestock impact wildlife is critical. While previous reviews have examined the impact of livestock on a wide variety of taxa, there have been no reviews examining how global livestock grazing affects amphibians. We conducted both an empirical study in south-central Florida examining the impact of cattle on amphibian communities and a quantitative literature review of similar studies on five continents. Our empirical study analyzed amphibian community responses to cattle as both a binary (presence/absence) variable, and as a continuous variable based on cow pie density. Across all analyses, we were unable to find any evidence that cattle affected the amphibian community at our study site. The literature review returned 46 papers that met our criteria for inclusion. Of these studies, 15 found positive effects of livestock on amphibians, 21 found neutral/mixed effects, and 10 found negative effects. Our quantitative analysis of these data indicates that amphibian species that historically occurred in closedcanopy habitats are generally negatively affected by livestock presence. In contrast, opencanopy amphibians are likely to experience positive effects from the presence of livestock, and these positive effects are most likely to occur in locations with cooler climates and/or greater precipitation seasonality. Collectively, our empirical work and literature review demonstrate that under the correct conditions well-managed rangelands are able to support diverse assemblages of amphibians. These rangeland ecosystems may play a critical role in protecting future amphibian biodiversity by serving as an "off-reserve" system to supplement the biodiversity conserved within traditional protected areas.

show abstract

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 80%

Amphibian responses to livestock use of wetlands: new empirical data and a global review

Howell

Mothes

Clements

et al. 2019

Ecological Applications

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Wetlands embedded in intensively managed pastures also tend to be more ditched, and more often grazed and trampled by cattle in the growing season (Medley et al . ). As a result, those wetlands are also more often dominated by a characteristic outer zone of Juncus effusus , which has low forage value and is difficult to remove by prescribed fire, mowing or roller chopping; indeed, J. effusus was identified as a significant indicator species of wetlands in intensively managed pastures.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Interactive effects of pasture management intensity, release from grazing and prescribed fire on forty subtropical wetland plant assemblages

Boughton¹,

Quintana‐Ascencio

Bohlen

et al. 2015

Journal of Applied Ecology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Summary Pasture management intensity, livestock grazing and prescribed fire are three widespread agricultural practices that affect small, isolated wetlands, but few studies have investigated their individual and interactive effects. Pasture management intensity refers to the degree of human alteration of grassland, ranging from intensively managed pastures planted with introduced forage, fertilizer/lime additions and artificial drainage to semi‐natural pastures with mixed native and non‐native vegetation, no fertilizer/lime additions and little or no artificial drainage. We examined individual and interactive effects of these three agricultural practices on individual, isolated wetlands using a replicated, full‐factorial experiment on 40 entire wetlands in south Florida, USA. Wetlands were embedded in two pasture management intensities: intensively managed and semi‐natural. After three years of treatment initiation, vegetation of wetlands released from grazing and unburned embedded in semi‐natural pastures had significantly lower evenness and coefficient of conservatism scores compared to wetlands released from grazing and burned, grazed unburned wetlands and grazed burned wetlands in the same pasture management intensity. For wetlands embedded in intensively managed pastures, evenness and coefficient of conservatism scores did not differ among treatments. Release from grazing increased abundance of the native, weedy herb, Eupatorium capillifolium. Grazing interacted with prescribed fire to affect shrub abundance and non‐native richness; relative abundance of shrubs and non‐native richness were greater in wetlands released from grazing and burned and did not differ among burn treatments in grazed wetlands. Interactive effects, especially three‐way interactions, were uncommon and not as important as differences between the two pasture management intensities. Synthesis and applications. Vegetation diversity and floristic quality of wetlands embedded in intensively managed pastures resisted common restoration management techniques such as release from grazing and prescribed fire, at least in the short term. In contrast, removing all top‐down disturbances from wetlands embedded in semi‐natural grasslands can negatively affect vegetation species diversity and floristic quality. Future studies should examine how intensity and seasonality of grazing and prescribed fire affect wetland vegetation, and track long‐term responses to evaluate lag effects.

show abstract

“…Medley et al. () also showed that pasture type was a strong driver of amphibian composition. Therefore, land use history has important consequences for the delivery of ecosystem services and is important for strategically identifying ranches and wetlands to participate in PES programs.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…, Medley et al. ), and provide forage ecosystem services relevant to cattle production, hydrological and nutrient management (Bohlen and Gathumbi , Ho et al. ), and cultural values (Swain et al.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Water retention structures installed at ranches affected wetlands, which provide multiple ecosystem services and have high biodiversity (Zedler 2003). Wetlands are important to Florida ranchlands because they represent 15-25% of the regional landscape (Hiscock et al 2003, Swain et al 2013, are high in biodiversity and sensitive to management (Boughton et al 2010, 2016, Kelly et al 2015, Medley et al 2015, and provide forage ecosystem services relevant to cattle production, hydrological and nutrient management Gathumbi 2007, Ho et al 2018), and cultural values (Swain et al 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Trade‐offs and synergies in a payment‐for‐ecosystem services program on ranchlands in the Everglades headwaters

et al. 2019

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Increasingly, agriculture is recognized as valuable not only for food production, but also for regulating and supporting ecosystem services such as those encompassing biodiversity and water. Various government programs provide incentives to farmers and ranchers to maintain ecosystem services, with an emerging focus on payment‐for‐ecosystem services (PES) programs. However, interactions among ecosystem services, including synergies or trade‐offs, at spatial scales relevant to land managers are not well understood. Here, we examined how a PES program for enhanced water retention on subtropical ranchlands in the headwaters of the Everglades affected seven indicators of ecosystem services and three indicators of disservices within wetlands (local scale) and among wetlands (wetland scale) at four different ranches. We used general linear mixed models and model selection to evaluate the feasibility of explicit, a priori hypotheses using data from 15 wetlands sampled across four participating ranches. Our study indicated that managing for increased water retention could result in both synergies and trade‐offs among ecosystem services. Higher water retention increased wetland plants at both local and wetland scales and was associated with reduced mosquitoes. Trade‐offs included significant declines in forage plant cover and decreases in amphibian abundance with higher water retention. Unimodal non‐linear relationships described responses of macroinvertebrates, fish, mosquito, and non‐native plant abundance to increasing water retention. These complex relationships indicate that optimizing water retention, provisioning services, and wetland biodiversity in ranchlands may not be straightforward. Unimodal non‐linear relationships among water retention and biodiversity suggest there is a threshold of water retention that represents a trade‐off for also maintaining biodiversity. Land use was an important driver of ecosystem disservices, with more intensely managed ranches having a greater potential for ecosystem disservices such as increased cover of non‐native plants, abundant mosquitoes, and lower amphibian abundance. Multidisciplinary collaboration was required to design, implement, monitor, and assess this PES program for trade‐offs and synergies.

show abstract

Intense ranchland management tips the balance of regional and local factors affecting wetland community structure

Cited by 19 publications

References 53 publications

Amphibian responses to livestock use of wetlands: new empirical data and a global review

Amphibian responses to livestock use of wetlands: new empirical data and a global review

Interactive effects of pasture management intensity, release from grazing and prescribed fire on forty subtropical wetland plant assemblages

Trade‐offs and synergies in a payment‐for‐ecosystem services program on ranchlands in the Everglades headwaters

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About