The Response of Peromyscus to Forest Opening Size in the Southern Appalachian Mountains

Buckner, Christine A.; Shure, Donald J.

doi:10.2307/1381242

Cited by 48 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 26 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Wet meadows were the only habitats where the mice did not occur . In most locales these mice increase or remain equally abundant with disturbance or deforestation , Van Horne 1981, Halvorson 1982, Martell 1983a, Buckner and Shure 1985, Medin 1986). Deer mice tend to be more abundant than red-backed voles in drier, rockier, forested habitats that are dominated by pines rather than spruce or firs (Millar et al 1985, Raphael 1988).…”

Section: Deer Mousementioning

confidence: 99%

Flammulated, boreal, and great gray owls in the United States: A technical conservation assessment

Hayward¹,

Verner²

1994

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Flammulated (Otus flammeolus), boreal (Aegolius funereus), and great gray (Strix nebulosa) owls occur over a broad portion of North America and each is designated as a "sensitive species" in four or more USDA Forest Service regons. The insectivorous flammulated owl is a neotropical migrant requiring suitable wintering habitat in the extreme southwestern United States, Mexico, and Central America as well as breeding habitat in the mountains of the western United States. Flammulated owls breed predominantly in yellow-pine (Pinus ponderosa and Pinus jefieyi) forests and are cavity nesters. The mature and older ponderosa pine forests used as breeding habitat by flammulated owls have changed during the past century due to fire management and timber harvest. In contrast, the boreal owl is a nomadic, small mammal specialist that occurs as an "island" species occupying subalpine and boreal forests. Movements among populations are probably important to boreal owl persistence, and coordinated management of disjunct populations in different Forest Service regions may be important. While the boreal owl's high altitude spruce-fir forests have remained relatively undisturbed in the past, they are coming under increasing harvest pressure as the stock of lower elevation older stands are depleted or reserved. Great gray owls in the western United States occur in mid to high elevation conifer forests. These owls usually nest in mature and older forest stands using existing raptor nests or tops of broken trees and snags for a nest platform. The species' requirement of a secure nesting platform leads to one potential ecological limitation on population size. Prey availability is the other factor thought to limit populations. Flammulated and boreal owls may face significant conservation problems in the absence of conservation planning. Both owls are associated with older forest habitats. Limited research on these species indicates that their demography and life history coupled with their fairly narrow habitat associations make them vulnerable to habitat change. Current forest management practices in many areas (i.e., stand replacement systems) remove quality habitat for these species. Therefore, on at least a local basis, persistence of these species could be in jeopardy, even in the short term. Long-term concerns are greater because the habitats that seem most important to these species require one to two centuries to regenerate. Furthermore, the population biology of both species necessitates across-region planning to facilitate effective conservation planning. Based on limited information, the persistence of great gray owl populations in the United States over both the short and long-term is more certain. Great gray owl foraging habitat use is more compatible with current forest management practices. Our understanding of the ecology and biology of these three species is not sufficient to produce a conclusive assessment of their conservation status. The enclosed assessments, however, give a sufficiently clear picture of ea...

show abstract

Section: Deer Mousementioning

confidence: 99%

Flammulated, boreal, and great gray owls in the United States: A technical conservation assessment

Hayward¹,

Verner²

1994

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Past research in the region has tended to focus at either end of the size-disturbance spectrum (small gaps or large clearcuts) with only limited consideration of species composition or recovery mechanisms within forest openings of different sizes (Buckner and Shure 1985;Runkle 1985;Shure and Phillips 1991;Shure and Wilson 1993). Consequently, the major goal of our long-term study in the southern Appalachians has been to examine the impact of disturbance size on revegetation processes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gap size and succession in cutover southern Appalachian forests: an 18 year study of vegetation dynamics

2006

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We used clearcut logging in establishing four replicated sizes of canopy openings (0.016, 0.08, 0.4, and 2.0 ha) in a southern Appalachian hardwood forest in 1981 to examine the long-term effects of disturbance size on plant community structure, biomass accumulation, aboveground net primary productivity (NPP), and mode of recovery. The reestablishment of NPP and biomass following logging was 6 -7-fold greater in large than small openings by 17 years. Total biomass in the 2.0 ha openings (127.3 Mg ha )1 ) recovered 59.5% as NPP (19.7 Mg ha )1 yr )1 ) reached 225% of precut forest levels. Biomass accumulation was 2.6 -3.6-fold greater in interior than edge locations of all but the 0.016 ha gaps. The absence of significant patch size or edge vs. interior differences in tree densities suggests that growth rates of individual trees were enhanced in more insolated microenvironments. Sprouting (86 -95% of tree NPP) was much more important than advance regeneration (4 -10%) or seedling germination (<2%) during early recovery in all opening sizes. Canopy dominant Quercus and Carya trees exhibited limited sprouting following disturbance. Instead, shade-intolerant Robinia pseudoacacia and Liriodendron tulipifera were major sprouters that used N-fixation (Robinia) and rapid growth (Liriodendron) in attaining 7.4 and 5.9 fold greater biomass accumulation, respectively in 2.0 ha than 0.016 ha opening sizes. Seedling germination and understory production were extensive in all openings following logging, but declined rapidly as the young tree canopy began closing by 4 -6 years. The relative importance of shade-intolerant tree biomass approximately doubled over 17 years as shade-tolerant tree seedlings, herbs, and shrubs gradually regained importance under the emerging canopy. Sprouting caused the persistence of a tree species composition in all openings that remained relatively similar to the precut forest. Large disturbances on mountain slopes of the southern Appalachians generally promote sprouting and rapid recovery, whereas small disturbances in low-elevation cove forests lead to a gradual recovery through seedling germination and/or advance regeneration. Continued logging in the southern Appalachians will increase the relative size and frequency of large disturbances, further the importance of sprouting of shadeintolerant species, and lead to more even-aged forest stands throughout the region.

show abstract

“…Leaf litter also influences moisture balance and seedling access to mineral soil (Molofsky and Augspurger 1992), so that the summed effect of leaf litter on recruitment success is unclear. Similarly, the foraging behavior of seed and seedling predators is affected by overstory condition and shrub cover (Buckner and Shure 1985;Whitmore and Brown 1996). Canopy gaps result in elevated light levels that benefit seedlings, but also influence predation intensity (Buckner and Shure 1985;Schupp et al 1989;Whitmore and Brown 1996;Abe et al 2001).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Similarly, the foraging behavior of seed and seedling predators is affected by overstory condition and shrub cover (Buckner and Shure 1985;Whitmore and Brown 1996). Canopy gaps result in elevated light levels that benefit seedlings, but also influence predation intensity (Buckner and Shure 1985;Schupp et al 1989;Whitmore and Brown 1996;Abe et al 2001). The interaction of predation with microsite conditions determines final recruitment success and may create spatial variability in regeneration niches that promotes species coexistence (Grubb 1977).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does predation contribute to tree diversity?

Beckage

Clark

2005

Oecologia

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Seed and seedling predation may differentially affect competitively superior tree species to increase the relative recruitment success of poor competitors and contribute to the coexistence of tree species. We examined the effect of seed and seedling predation on the seedling recruitment of three tree species, Acer rubrum (red maple), Liriodendron tulipifera (yellow poplar), and Quercus rubra (northern red oak), over three years by manipulating seed and seedling exposure to predators under contrasting microsite conditions of shrub cover, leaf litter, and overstory canopy. Species rankings of seedling emergence were constant across microsites, regardless of exposure to seed predators, but varied across years. A. rubrum had the highest emergence probabilities across microsites in 1997, but Q. rubra had the highest emergence probabilities in 1999. Predators decreased seedling survival uniformly across species, but did not affect relative growth rates (RGRs). Q. rubra had the highest seedling survivorship across microsites, while L. tulipifera had the highest RGRs. Our results suggest that annual variability in recruitment success contributes more to seedling diversity than differential predation across microsites. We synthesized our results from separate seedling emergence and survival experiments to project seedling bank composition. With equal fecundity assumed across species, Q. rubra dominated the seedling bank, capturing 90% of the regeneration sites on average, followed by A. rubrum (8% of sites) and L. tulipifera (2% of sites). When seed abundance was weighted by species-specific fecundity, seedling bank composition was more diverse; L. tulipifera captured 62% of the regeneration sites, followed by A. rubrum (21% of sites) and Q. rubra (17% of sites). Tradeoffs between seedling performance and fecundity may promote the diversity of seedling regeneration by increasing the probability of inferior competitors capturing regeneration sites.

show abstract

The Response of Peromyscus to Forest Opening Size in the Southern Appalachian Mountains

Cited by 48 publications

References 26 publications

Flammulated, boreal, and great gray owls in the United States: A technical conservation assessment

Flammulated, boreal, and great gray owls in the United States: A technical conservation assessment

Gap size and succession in cutover southern Appalachian forests: an 18 year study of vegetation dynamics

Does predation contribute to tree diversity?

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About