Negative Effects of an Exotic Grass Invasion on Small-Mammal Communities

Freeman, Eric D.; Sharp, Tiffanny R.; Larsen, Randy T.; Knight, Rob; Slater, Steven J.; McMillan, Brock R.

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0108843

Cited by 48 publications

(70 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Given the wave of invasive plant species that has swept across the Great Basin in the past century, it is possible that today's habitats provide lower-quality resources than did habitats of the past (32,33). Thus, climate-driven habitat restructuring at the terminal Pleistocene may have preserved overall ecosystem productivity, while anthropogenically driven habitat conversion today has decoupled productivity from climate.…”

Section: Have Human Activities Yielded An Energetically Novel Ecosystem?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Small mammal communities are directly impacted by this invasion as a result of the resulting alteration of habitat structure from one that is open to one that is closed (32,33). Although grasses were certainly present and often abundant in the Holocene shrublands of the northern Bonneville Basin, they were perennial native bunch grasses that maintained an open habitat structure (7,9).…”

Section: Have Human Activities Yielded An Energetically Novel Ecosystem?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Furthermore, Lightfoot et al (36) have recently shown that species affiliated with natural annual grasslands in the Chihuahuan desert exhibit greater reproductive potential, and thus faster population responses to changes in resources, than shrub-affiliated species. Thus, although cheatgrass appears to negatively impact most if not all small mammal species (32,33), small, grass-affiliated quadrupedal species might be expected to prosper compared with their larger and/or shrubaffiliated counterparts.…”

Section: Have Human Activities Yielded An Energetically Novel Ecosystem?mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Energy flow and functional compensation in Great Basin small mammals under natural and anthropogenic environmental change

Terry

Rowe

2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Research on the ecological impacts of environmental change has primarily focused at the species level, leaving the responses of ecosystem-level properties like energy flow poorly understood. This is especially so over millennial timescales inaccessible to direct observation. Here we examine how energy flow within a Great Basin small mammal community responded to climate-driven environmental change during the past 12,800 y, and use this baseline to evaluate responses observed during the past century. Our analyses reveal marked stability in energy flow during rapid climatic warming at the terminal Pleistocene despite dramatic turnover in the distribution of mammalian body sizes and habitat-associated functional groups. Functional group turnover was strongly correlated with climatedriven changes in regional vegetation, with climate and vegetation change preceding energetic shifts in the small mammal community. In contrast, the past century has witnessed a substantial reduction in energy flow caused by an increase in energetic dominance of smallbodied species with an affinity for closed grass habitats. This suggests that modern changes in land cover caused by anthropogenic activities-particularly the spread of nonnative annual grasslandshas led to a breakdown in the compensatory dynamics of energy flow. Human activities are thus modifying the small mammal community in ways that differ from climate-driven expectations, resulting in an energetically novel ecosystem. Our study illustrates the need to integrate across ecological and temporal scales to provide robust insights for long-term conservation and management.paleoecology | Quaternary | desert rodents | body size | invasive grass T he chronic and cumulative anthropogenic impacts of the past century have spurred considerable shifts in climates and habitats over local to global scales. Efforts to understand ecological responses to these changes have largely been focused at the species level (e.g., range shifts) over annual to decadal timescales. However, climate and habitat change impact biotas across all levels of ecological organization, from individuals to entire ecosystems. Furthermore, many ecological processes unfold over timescales inaccessible to direct observation or experimentation (1). Evaluating the response of higher-level aggregate properties (e.g., energy flow) to environmental change across centennial to millennial timescales can thus provide the temporal context needed to assess whether modern systems now fall within or outside their natural range of variability.Emphasis on species-level responses to environmental change is rooted in the paradigm that populations are highly dynamic while the aggregate properties of a community remain relatively stable and are thus more robust to perturbation. Aggregate properties have been shown to reflect resource availability (2, 3), and their stability has often been attributed to compensatory dynamics among individual species or functional groups (4). However, recent work has shown that marked change in aggrega...

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Section: Have Human Activities Yielded An Energetically Novel Ecosystem?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Have Human Activities Yielded An Energetically Novel Ecosystem?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Have Human Activities Yielded An Energetically Novel Ecosystem?mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Energy flow and functional compensation in Great Basin small mammals under natural and anthropogenic environmental change

Terry

Rowe

2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…When repeated regularly, these management techniques cause overall diminishment of the variety of floral resources, and of the complexity of habitat required for the accumulation of nesting substrates Dixon 2009). In addition, episodic mowing on transmission line easements favors invasive plants, which can sometimes be problematic for native wildlife (Drake et al 2016;Freeman et al 2014;Bezemer et al 2014). One management strategy currently being explored by transmission companies throughout the US could potentially mitigate both problems.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Increasing the conservation value of powerline corridors for wild bees through vegetation management: an experimental approach

Russell

Kaplan

et al. 2018

Biodivers Conserv

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Mounting evidence suggests declines in the abundance and diversity of wild bees. Increasing habitat that provides forage and nesting sites could boost struggling populations, particularly in urban, suburban and agricultural landscapes. The millions of acres beneath aerial electric transmission lines, sometimes referred to as easements or rights-ofway, must be kept free of tall-growing vegetation and hence have the potential to provide suitable habitat for many native species. Prior work has demonstrated that bee communities in easements managed using alternatives to episodic mowing were more diverse than in nearby open areas, however true control sites within the easements were unavailable. In order to compare vegetation management protocols, we conducted a two-year study which enabled us to directly compare transmission line easements in three locations currently undergoing Integrated Vegetation Management-a dynamic form of management involving spot removal and herbicide treatment of unwanted species (treatment) with nearby sites undergoing standard management protocols of yearly or biyearly mowing (control). Results show that treatment sites had significantly higher abundance and species richness than controls. Seasonal differences were pronounced, with the spring fauna most affected Communicated by David Hawksworth. 1 3 Electronic supplementary materialby differences in vegetation management. In addition, the older treatment sites house more social bees, more parasitic species and a more even distribution of bees across nesting guilds. Finally, we established that treatment sites had distinct bee communities, further increasing their value as sources for native bee populations in the landscape. Overall, the data clearly show the value of implementing alternative active vegetation management in the land under powerlines to achieve an increase in the abundance and diversity of wild bees.

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“…Contemporary studies of numerous invaded sites across the Great Basin also show marked declines in small mammal richness and community abundance, with an increasing percentage of cheatgrass cover (even after the shrub cover was lost) and time since invasion (15). These changes likely result from both direct (decrease in food or habitat availability or restricted mobility) and indirect (decreased shrub cover and increased fire frequency) effects.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy flow and the “grassification” of desert shrublands

Betancourt

2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Negative Effects of an Exotic Grass Invasion on Small-Mammal Communities

Cited by 48 publications

References 34 publications

Energy flow and functional compensation in Great Basin small mammals under natural and anthropogenic environmental change

Energy flow and functional compensation in Great Basin small mammals under natural and anthropogenic environmental change

Increasing the conservation value of powerline corridors for wild bees through vegetation management: an experimental approach

Energy flow and the “grassification” of desert shrublands

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