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Heterogeneity promotes resilience in restored prairie: Implications for the environmental heterogeneity hypothesis Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Ashley A. Wojciechowski, John M. Blair, Scott L. Collins, Sara G. Baer
Enhancing resilience in formerly degraded ecosystems is an important goal of restoration ecology. However, evidence for the recovery of resilience and its underlying mechanisms require long‐term experiments and comparison with reference ecosystems. We used data from an experimental prairie restoration that featured long‐term soil heterogeneity manipulations and data from two long‐term experiments located
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Functional responses of understory plants to natural disturbance‐based management in eastern and western Canada Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Marion Noualhaguet, Timothy T. Work, Charles A. Nock, S. Ellen Macdonald, Isabelle Aubin, Nicole J. Fenton
Natural disturbance‐based management (NDBM) is hypothesized to maintain managed forest ecosystem integrity by reducing differences between natural and managed forests. The effectiveness of this approach often entails local comparisons of species composition or diversity for a variety of biota from managed and unmanaged forests. Understory vegetation is regularly the focus of such comparison because
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Impacts of stream drying depend on stream network size and location of drying Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-16 Megan C. Malish, Shang Gao, Daniel C. Allen, Thomas M. Neeson
Stream drying is increasing globally, with widespread impacts on stream ecosystems. Here, we investigated how the impacts of drying on stream ecosystem connectivity might depend on stream network size and the location of drying within the stream network. Using 11 stream networks from across the United States, we simulated drying scenarios in which we varied the location and spatial extent of drying
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Centering Amah Mutsun voices in the analysis of a culturally important, fire‐managed coastal grassland Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-15 Annalise Taylor, Alexii Sigona, Maggi Kelly
Indigenous communities throughout California, USA, are increasingly advocating for and practicing cultural fire stewardship, leading to a host of social, cultural, and ecological benefits. Simultaneously, state agencies are recognizing the importance of controlled burning and cultural fire as a means of reducing the risk of severe wildfire while benefiting fire‐adapted ecosystems. However, much of
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Mimicking functional elements of the natural flow regime promotes native fish recovery in a regulated river Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-14 Ethan M. Baruch, Sarah M. Yarnell, Theodore E. Grantham, Jessica R. Ayers, Andrew L. Rypel, Robert A. Lusardi
Streamflow regimes that maintain vital functions and processes of aquatic ecosystems are critical to sustaining ecosystem health. In rivers with altered flow regimes, restoring components of the natural flow regime is predicted to conserve freshwater biodiversity by supporting ecological functions and geomorphological processes to which native communities are adapted. However, the effectiveness of
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Unraveling spatial heterogeneity of soil legacy phosphorus in subtropical grasslands Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-10 Jiangxiao Qiu, Ran Zhi, Elizabeth H. Boughton, Haoyu Li, Charlotte R. B. Henderson, Daniel F. Petticord, Jed P. Sparks, Amartya Saha, K. Ramesh Reddy
Humans have profoundly altered phosphorus (P) cycling across scales. Agriculturally driven changes (e.g., excessive P‐fertilization and manure addition), in particular, have resulted in pronounced P accumulations in soils, often known as “soil legacy P.” These legacy P reserves serve as persistent and long‐term nonpoint sources, inducing downstream eutrophication and ecosystem services degradation
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Strong and consistent effects of waterbird composition on HPAI H5 occurrences across Europe Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-09 Shenglai Yin, Chi Xu, Yong Zhang, Willem F. de Boer, Taej Mundkur, Jean Artois, Francisca C. Velkers, John Y. Takekawa, Yali Si, Huaiyu Tian, Guan‐Zhu Han, Yuyang Chen, Hongliang Chai, Lijuan Cui, Zheng Y. X. Huang
Since 2014, highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5 viruses of clade 2.3.4.4 have been dominating the outbreaks across Europe, causing massive deaths among poultry and wild birds. However, the factors shaping these broad‐scale outbreak patterns, especially those related to waterbird community composition, remain unclear. In particular, we do not know whether these risk factors differ from those
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Longevity of hymenopteran parasitoids in natural versus agricultural habitats and implications for biological control Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-07-09 Miriam Kishinevsky, Anthony R. Ives
Agricultural habitats are frequently disturbed, and disturbances could have major effects on species in upper trophic levels such as hymenopteran parasitoids that are important for biological control. A strategy for conservation biological control is to provide a diversified agricultural landscape which increases the availability of resources such as sugar required by parasitoid biological control
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Disturbance‐mediated changes to boreal mammal spatial networks in industrializing landscapes Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-06-26 Gonçalo Curveira‐Santos, Solène Marion, Chris Sutherland, Christopher Beirne, Emily J. Herdman, Erin R. Tattersall, Joanna M. Burgar, Jason T. Fisher, A. Cole Burton
Compound effects of anthropogenic disturbances on wildlife emerge through a complex network of direct responses and species interactions. Land‐use changes driven by energy and forestry industries are known to disrupt predator–prey dynamics in boreal ecosystems, yet how these disturbance effects propagate across mammal communities remains uncertain. Using structural equation modeling, we tested disturbance‐mediated
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Conserving ecosystem integrity: Ecological theory as a guide for marine protected area monitoring Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-06-25 Anya Dunham, Josephine C. Iacarella, Karen L. Hunter, Sarah C. Davies, Sarah Dudas, Katie S. P. Gale, Emily Rubidge, Stephanie K. Archer
Global policies increasingly focus on the importance of maintaining or improving the integrity of ecosystems, but defining, assessing, and monitoring integrity in marine protected areas (MPAs) remains a challenge. In this paper, we conceptualized ecological integrity along dimensions of heterogeneity and stability containing seven components: physical structure, diversity, function, persistence, resistance
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Mowing increased community stability in semiarid grasslands more than either fencing or grazing Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-22 Tianqi Zhao, Rongzhen Suo, Aklilu W. Alemu, Jiahua Zheng, Feng Zhang, Alan D. Iwaasa, Jianying Guo, Mengli Zhao, Bin Zhang
A substantial body of empirical evidence suggests that anthropogenic disturbance can affect the structure and function of grassland ecosystems. Despite this, few studies have elucidated the mechanisms through which grazing and mowing, the two most widespread land management practices, affect the stability of natural grassland communities. In this study, we draw upon 9 years of field data from natural
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Long‐term frequent fire and cattle grazing alter dry forest understory vegetation Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-16 Becky K. Kerns, Michelle A. Day
Understanding fire and large herbivore interactions in interior western forests is critical, owing to the extensive and widespread co‐occurrence of these two disturbance types and multiple present and future implications for forest resilience, conservation and restoration. However, manipulative studies focused on interactions and outcomes associated with these two disturbances are rare in forested
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Rodents mediate the relationship between seed rain, seed bank, and plant community with increased grazing disturbance Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-16 Zengpeng Guo, Yunpeng Zhao, Panhong Zhang, Hui Zhang, Carol C. Baskin, Tianwu Zhang, Yaya Chen, Guorui Hu, Xiangrong Yang, He Mao, Zhenkuan Zhang, Miaojun Ma
Seed rain and the soil seed bank represent the dispersal of seeds in space and time, respectively, and can be important sources of recruitment of new individuals during plant community regeneration. However, the temporal dynamics of seed rain and the mechanisms by which the seed rain and soil seed bank may play a role in plant community regeneration with increased grazing disturbance remain unclear
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Wild herbivores and cattle have differing effects on postfire herbaceous vegetation recovery in an African savanna Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-15 Sherril P. Masudi, Wilfred O. Odadi, Duncan M. Kimuyu, Charles K. Gachuiri, Ryan L. Sensenig, Truman P. Young
Fire and herbivory have profound effects on vegetation in savanna ecosystems, but little is known about how different herbivore groups influence vegetation dynamics after fire. We assessed the separate and combined effects of herbivory by cattle and wild meso‐ and megaherbivores on postfire herbaceous vegetation cover, species richness, and species turnover in a savanna ecosystem in central Kenya.
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Prairie restoration promotes the abundance and diversity of mutualistic arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-13 Kevin A. MacColl, Micaela Tosi, Pierre‐Luc Chagnon, Andrew S. MacDougall, Kari E. Dunfield, Hafiz Maherali
Predicting how biological communities assemble in restored ecosystems can assist in conservation efforts, but most research has focused on plants, with relatively little attention paid to soil microbial organisms that plants interact with. Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi are an ecologically significant functional group of soil microbes that form mutualistic symbioses with plants and could therefore
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Secondary production of the central rangeland region of the United States Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-10 Edward J. Raynor, Justin D. Derner, Melannie D. Hartman, Christopher D. Dorich, William J. Parton, John R. Hendrickson, Keith R. Harmoney, Jameson R. Brennan, Clenton E. Owensby, Nicole E. Kaplan, Susan M. Lutz, David L. Hoover, David J. Augustine
Rangelands are the dominant land use across a broad swath of central North America where they span a wide gradient, from <350 to >900 mm, in mean annual precipitation. Substantial efforts have examined temporal and spatial variation in aboveground net primary production (ANPP) to precipitation (PPT) across this gradient. In contrast, net secondary productivity (NSP, e.g., primary consumer production)
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Land‐use homogenization reduces the occurrence and diversity of frugivorous birds in a tropical biodiversity hotspot Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-10 Fernando César Gonçalves Bonfim, Mauro Galetti, Maíra Benchimol, José Carlos Morante‐Filho, Marcelo Magioli, Eliana Cazetta
Understanding how human‐modified landscapes maintain biodiversity and provide ecosystem services is crucial for establishing conservation practices. Given that responses to land‐use are species‐specific, it is crucial to understand how land‐use changes may shape patterns of species diversity and persistence in human‐modified landscapes. Here, we used a comprehensive data set on bird distribution from
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Ecological and anthropogenic drivers of waterfowl productivity are synchronous across species, space, and time Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-07 Mitch D. Weegman, James H. Devries, Robert G. Clark, David W. Howerter, Daniel Gibson, J. Patrick Donnelly, Todd W. Arnold
Knowledge of interspecific and spatiotemporal variation in demography–environment relationships is key for understanding the population dynamics of sympatric species and developing multispecies conservation strategies. We used hierarchical random‐effects models to examine interspecific and spatial variation in annual productivity in six migratory ducks (i.e., American wigeon [Mareca americana], blue‐winged
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Combining mesocosms with models reveals effects of global warming and ocean acidification on a temperate marine ecosystem Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-05-06 Hadayet Ullah, Damien A. Fordham, Silvan U. Goldenberg, Ivan Nagelkerken
Ocean warming and species exploitation have already caused large‐scale reorganization of biological communities across the world. Accurate projections of future biodiversity change require a comprehensive understanding of how entire communities respond to global change. We combined a time‐dynamic integrated food web modeling approach (Ecosim) with previous data from community‐level mesocosm experiments
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Allometric relationships and trade‐offs in 11 common Mediterranean‐climate grasses Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-30 Xiulin Gao, Charles D. Koven, Lara M. Kueppers
Biomass allocation in plants is the foundation for understanding dynamics in ecosystem carbon balance, species competition, and plant–environment interactions. However, existing work on plant allometry has mainly focused on trees, with fewer studies having developed allometric equations for grasses. Grasses with different life histories can vary in their carbon investment by prioritizing the growth
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Misapplied management makes matters worse: Spatially explicit control leverages biotic interactions to slow invasion Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-22 Emily Howerton, Tracy Langkilde, Katriona Shea
A wide range of approaches has been used to manage the spread of invasive species, yet invaders continue to be a challenge to control. In some cases, management actions have no effect or may even inadvertently benefit the targeted invader. Here, we use the mid‐20th century management of the Red Imported Fire Ant, Solenopsis invicta, in the US as a motivating case study to explore the conditions under
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Effectiveness of population‐based recovery actions for threatened southern mountain caribou Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-17 Clayton T. Lamb, Sara Williams, Stan Boutin, Michael Bridger, Deborah Cichowski, Kristina Cornhill, Craig DeMars, Melanie Dickie, Bevan Ernst, Adam Ford, Michael P. Gillingham, Laura Greene, Douglas C. Heard, Mark Hebblewhite, Dave Hervieux, Mike Klaczek, Bruce N. McLellan, R. Scott McNay, Lalenia Neufeld, Barry Nobert, J. Joshua Nowak, Agnès Pelletier, Aaron Reid, Anne‐Marie Roberts, Mike Russell
Habitat loss is affecting many species, including the southern mountain caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) population in western North America. Over the last half century, this threatened caribou population's range and abundance have dramatically contracted. An integrated population model was used to analyze 51 years (1973–2023) of demographic data from 40 southern mountain caribou subpopulations
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Fitting individual‐based models of spatial population dynamics to long‐term monitoring data Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-17 Anne‐Kathleen Malchow, Guillermo Fandos, Urs G. Kormann, Martin U. Grüebler, Marc Kéry, Florian Hartig, Damaris Zurell
Generating spatial predictions of species distribution is a central task for research and policy. Currently, correlative species distribution models (cSDMs) are among the most widely used tools for this purpose. However, a fundamental assumption of cSDMs, that species distributions are in equilibrium with their environment, is rarely fulfilled in real data and limits the applicability of cSDMs for
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Blending Indigenous and western science: Quantifying cultural burning impacts in Karuk Aboriginal Territory Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-15 Skye M. Greenler, Frank K. Lake, William Tripp, Kathy McCovey, Analisa Tripp, Leaf G. Hillman, Christopher J. Dunn, Susan J. Prichard, Paul F. Hessburg, Will Harling, John D. Bailey
The combined effects of Indigenous fire stewardship and lightning ignitions shaped historical fire regimes, landscape patterns, and available resources in many ecosystems globally. The resulting fire regimes created complex fire–vegetation dynamics that were further influenced by biophysical setting, disturbance history, and climate. While there is increasing recognition of Indigenous fire stewardship
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Urbanization exacerbates climate sensitivity of eastern United States broadleaf trees Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-11 Kayla Warner, Nancy Falxa Sonti, Elizabeth M. Cook, Richard A. Hallett, Lucy R. Hutyra, Andrew B. Reinmann
Tree growth is a key mechanism driving carbon sequestration in forest ecosystems. Environmental conditions are important regulators of tree growth that can vary considerably between nearby urban and rural forests. For example, trees growing in cities often experience hotter and drier conditions than their rural counterparts while also being exposed to higher levels of light, pollution, and nutrient
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Ungulates mitigate the effects of drought and shrub encroachment on the fire hazard of Mediterranean oak woodlands Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-06 Xavier Lecomte, Miguel N. Bugalho, Filipe X. Catry, Paulo M. Fernandes, Andreu Cera, Maria C. Caldeira
Climate change is increasing the frequency of droughts and the risk of severe wildfires, which can interact with shrub encroachment and browsing by wild ungulates. Wild ungulate populations are expanding due, among other factors, to favorable habitat changes resulting from land abandonment or land‐use changes. Understanding how ungulate browsing interacts with drought to affect woody plant mortality
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Erratum Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-05
Erratum for Conlisk, Erin E., Gregory H. Golet, Mark D. Reynolds, Blake A. Barbaree, Kristin A. Sesser, Kristin B. Byrd, Sam Veloz, and Matthew E. Reiter. 2022. Both real-time and long-term environmental data perform well in predicting shorebird distributions in managed habitat. Ecological Applications 32(4):e2510. https://doi.org/10.1002/eap.2510 An error has been found in Figures 4 and 5 of the published
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Nitrogen addition alleviates the adverse effects of drought on plant productivity in a temperate steppe Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-02 Yonghong Luo, Lan Du, Jiatao Zhang, Haiyan Ren, Yan Shen, Jinbao Zhang, Na Li, Ru Tian, Shan Wang, Heyong Liu, Zhuwen Xu
Drought and nitrogen enrichment could profoundly affect the productivity of semiarid ecosystems. However, how ecosystem productivity will respond to different drought scenarios, especially with a concurrent increase in nitrogen availability, is still poorly understood. Using data from a 4‐year field experiment conducted in a semiarid temperate steppe, we explored the responses of aboveground net primary
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Recruitment of a threatened foundation oyster species varies with large and small spatial scales Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-02 Rick C. Leong, Ana B. Bugnot, Pauline M. Ross, Katherine R. Erickson, Mitchell C. Gibbs, Ezequiel M. Marzinelli, Wayne A. O'Connor, Laura M. Parker, Alistair G. B. Poore, Elliot Scanes, Paul E. Gribben
Understanding how habitat attributes (e.g., patch area and sizes, connectivity) control recruitment and how this is modified by processes operating at larger spatial scales is fundamental to understanding population sustainability and developing successful long‐term restoration strategies for marine foundation species—including for globally threatened reef‐forming oysters. In two experiments, we assessed
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Cross‐scale analysis reveals interacting predictors of annual and perennial cover in Northern Great Basin rangelands Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-04-01 Madelon F. Case, Kirk W. Davies, Chad S. Boyd, Lina Aoyama, Joanna Merson, Calvin Penkauskas, Lauren M. Hallett
Exotic annual grass invasion is a widespread threat to the integrity of sagebrush ecosystems in Western North America. Although many predictors of annual grass prevalence and native perennial vegetation have been identified, there remains substantial uncertainty about how regional‐scale and local‐scale predictors interact to determine vegetation heterogeneity, and how associations between vegetation
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Multi‐Factor Coral Disease Risk: A new product for early warning and management Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-25 Jamie M. Caldwell, Gang Liu, Erick Geiger, Scott F. Heron, C. Mark Eakin, Jacqueline De La Cour, Austin Greene, Laurie Raymundo, Jen Dryden, Audrey Schlaff, Jessica S. Stella, Tye L. Kindinger, Courtney S. Couch, Douglas Fenner, Whitney Hoot, Derek Manzello, Megan J. Donahue
Ecological forecasts are becoming increasingly valuable tools for conservation and management. However, there are few examples of near‐real‐time forecasting systems that account for the wide range of ecological complexities. We developed a new coral disease ecological forecasting system that explores a suite of ecological relationships and their uncertainty and investigates how forecast skill changes
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Farm management and landscape context shape plant diversity at wetland edges in the Prairie Pothole Region of Canada Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-20 David Anthony Kirk, Juan Andrés Martínez‐Lanfranco, Douglas J. Forsyth, Amanda E. Martin
Evaluating the impacts of farming systems on biodiversity is increasingly important given the need to stem biodiversity loss, decrease fossil fuel dependency, and maintain ecosystem services benefiting farmers. We recorded woody and herbaceous plant species diversity, composition, and abundance in 43 wetland‐adjacent prairie remnants beside crop fields managed using conventional, minimum tillage, organic
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Logging response alters trajectories of reorganization after loss of a foundation tree species Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-14 Audrey Barker Plotkin, David A. Orwig, Meghan Graham MacLean, Aaron M. Ellison
Forest insect outbreaks cause large changes in ecosystem structure, composition, and function. Humans often respond to insect outbreaks by conducting salvage logging, which can amplify the immediate effects, but it is unclear whether logging will result in lasting differences in forest structure and dynamics when compared with forests affected only by insect outbreaks. We used 15 years of data from
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Plant responses to elevated CO2 under competing hypotheses of nitrogen and phosphorus limitations Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-12 Qing Zhu, William J. Riley, Jinyun Tang, Nicholas J. Bouskill
The future ecosystem carbon cycle has important implications for biosphere-climate feedback. The magnitude of future plant growth and carbon accumulation depends on plant strategies for nutrient uptake under the stresses of nitrogen (N) versus phosphorus (P) limitations. Two archetypal theories have been widely acknowledged in the literature to represent N and P limitations on ecosystem processes:
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Eradicating an invasive mammal requires local elimination and reduced reinvasion from an urban source population Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-05 Charlotte R. Patterson, Audrey Lustig, Philip J. Seddon, Deborah J. Wilson, Yolanda van Heezik
Invasive mammal eradications are increasingly attempted across large, complex landscapes. Sequentially controlled management zones can be at risk of reinvasion from adjacent uncontrolled areas, and managers must weigh the relative benefits of ensuring complete elimination from a zone or minimizing reinvasion risk. This is complicated in urban areas, where habitat heterogeneity and a lack of baseline
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Widespread agrochemicals differentially affect zooplankton biomass and community structure: Comment Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-05 Rebecca C. Rooney, Jose Luis Rodriguez-Gil
Determining the combined effects of multiple contaminants on freshwater ecosystems poses a major challenge to ecotoxicology but is vital to advance realism in the discipline and to ensure that risk assessments account for indirect effects and interacting factors on multispecies assemblages (Fleeger et al., 2003; Relyea, 2009). We therefore appreciate the approach by Hébert et al. (2021), who used outdoor
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Biotic interactions in soil and dung shape parasite transmission in temperate ruminant systems: An integrative framework Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-03-01 Christopher J. Boughton, Lesley T. Lancaster, Eric R. Morgan
Gastrointestinal helminth parasites undergo part of their life cycle outside their host, such that developmental stages interact with the soil and dung fauna. These interactions are capable of affecting parasite transmission on pastures yet are generally ignored in current models, empirical studies and practical management. Dominant methods of parasite control, which rely on anthelmintic medications
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Recolonization of secondary forests by a locally extinct Caribbean anole through the lens of range expansion theory Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-29 Miguel A. Acevedo, Carly Fankhauser, Luis González, Marné Quigg, Bella Gonzalez, Riccardo Papa
Disturbance and recovery dynamics are characteristic features of many ecosystems. Disturbance dynamics are widely studied in ecology and conservation biology. Still, we know less about the ecological processes that drive ecosystem recovery. The ecological processes that mediate ecosystem recovery stand at the intersection of many theoretical frameworks. Range expansion theory is one of these complementary
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Eastern Canadian boreal forest soil and foliar chemistry show evidence of resilience to long-term nitrogen addition Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-29 Daniel Houle, Jean-David Moore, Marie Renaudin
The boreal forest is one of the world's largest terrestrial biome and plays crucial roles in global biogeochemical cycles, such as carbon (C) sequestration in vegetation and soil. However, the impacts of decades of N deposition on N-limited ecosystems, like the eastern Canadian boreal forest, remain unclear. For 13 years, N deposition was simulated by periodically adding ammonium nitrate on soils of
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Local and regional-scale effects of hedgerows on grassland- and forest-associated bird populations within agroecosystems Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-29 Devin R. de Zwaan, Kevin C. Hannah, Niloofar Alavi, Greg W. Mitchell, David R. Lapen, Jason Duffe, Scott Wilson
Linear woody features (LWFs), like hedgerows along field edges, provide wildlife habitat and support biodiversity in agroecosystems. Assessments of LWFs usually focus on community-level indices, such as species richness. However, effective conservation actions need to balance the contrasting habitat preferences of different wildlife species, necessitating a focus on population-level effects in working
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Human access constrains optimal foraging and habitat availability in an avian generalist Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-28 Nicholas M. Masto, Abigail G. Blake-Bradshaw, Cory J. Highway, Allison C. Keever, Jamie C. Feddersen, Heath M. Hagy, Bradley S. Cohen
Animals balance costs of antipredator behaviors with resource acquisition to minimize hunting and other mortality risks and maximize their physiological condition. This inherent trade-off between forage abundance, its quality, and mortality risk is intensified in human-dominated landscapes because fragmentation, habitat loss, and degradation of natural vegetation communities is often coupled with artificially
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Natural vegetation biomass and the dimension of forest quality in tropical agricultural landscapes Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-25 Renato Miazaki de Toledo, Vania Regina Pivello, Michael Philip Perring, Luciano Martins Verdade
Forest cover has been a pivotal indicator of biological conservation and carrying capacity for wildlife in forest ecoregions. Such a relationship underpins policies focused on the extension of protected lands. Here, we estimate aboveground biomass (AGB) as a proxy for habitat quality in seminatural rural patches and provide a comparison with approaches that only consider forest cover. We hypothesize
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The long shadow of woody encroachment: An integrated approach to modeling grassland songbird habitat Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-21 Katy M. Silber, Trevor J. Hefley, Henry N. Castro-Miller, Zak Ratajczak, W. Alice Boyle
Animals must track resources over relatively fine spatial and temporal scales, particularly in disturbance-mediated systems like grasslands. Grassland birds respond to habitat heterogeneity by dispersing among sites within and between years, yet we know little about how they make post-dispersal settlement decisions. Many methods exist to quantify the resource selection of mobile taxa, but the habitat
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A meta-analysis reveals increases in soil organic carbon following the restoration and recovery of croplands in Southwest China Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-21 Zihao Guo, Shuting Zhang, Lichen Zhang, Yangzhou Xiang, Jianping Wu
In China, the Grain for Green Program (GGP) is an ambitious project to convert croplands into natural vegetation, but exactly how changes in vegetation translate into changes in soil organic carbon remains less clear. Here we conducted a meta-analysis using 734 observations to explore the effects of land recovery on soil organic carbon and nutrients in four provinces in Southwest China. Following GGP
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Optimal allocation of resources among general and species-specific tools for plant pest biosecurity surveillance Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-20 Hoa-Thi-Minh Nguyen, Long Chu, Andrew M. Liebhold, Rebecca Epanchin-Niell, John M. Kean, Tom Kompas, Andrew P. Robinson, Eckehard G. Brockerhoff, Joslin L. Moore
This paper proposes a surveillance model for plant pests that can optimally allocate resources among survey tools with varying properties. While some survey tools are highly specific for the detection of a single pest species, others are more generalized. There is considerable variation in the cost and sensitivity of these tools, but there are no guidelines or frameworks for identifying which tools
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Distinct latitudinal patterns and drivers of topsoil nitrogen and phosphorus across urban forests in eastern China Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-15 Nan Xia, Enzai Du, Xinhui Wu, Yang Tang, Hongbo Guo, Yang Wang
Nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) are the two most important macronutrients supporting forest growth. Unprecedented urbanization has created growing areas of urban forests that provide key ecosystem services for city dwellers. However, the large-scale patterns of soil N and P content remain poorly understood in urban forests. Based on a systematic soil survey in urban forests from nine large cities across
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Sustaining eastern oak forests: Synergistic effects of fire and topography on vegetation and fuels Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-13 Todd F. Hutchinson, Bryce T. Adams, Matthew B. Dickinson, Maryjane Heckel, Alejandro A. Royo, Melissa A. Thomas-Van Gundy
Across much of the eastern United States, oak forests are undergoing mesophication as shade-tolerant competitors become more abundant and suppress oak regeneration. Given the historical role of anthropogenic surface fires in promoting oak dominance, prescribed fire has become important in efforts to reverse mesophication and sustain oaks. In 2000 we established the Ohio Hills Fire and Fire Surrogate
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Temporal dynamics in the composition of bird communities along a gradient of farmland restoration Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-02 Angie Haslem, Rohan H. Clarke, Alex C. Maisey, Alistair Stewart, James Q. Radford, Andrew F. Bennett
Revegetation plantings are a key activity in farmland restoration and are commonly assumed to support biotic communities that, with time, replicate those of reference habitats. Restoration outcomes, however, can be highly variable and difficult to predict; hence there is value in quantifying restoration success to improve future efforts. We test the expectation that, over time, revegetation will restore
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Concurrent threats and extinction risk in a long-lived, highly fecund vertebrate with parental care Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-02-01 George C. Brooks, William A. Hopkins, Holly K. Kindsvater
Detecting declines and quantifying extinction risk of long-lived, highly fecund vertebrates, including fishes, reptiles, and amphibians, can be challenging. In addition to the false notion that large clutches always buffer against population declines, the imperiled status of long-lived species can often be masked by extinction debt, wherein adults persist on the landscape for several years after populations
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Wetlands as a potential multifunctioning tool to mitigate eutrophication and brownification Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-01-29 Anna Borgström, Lars-Anders Hansson, Clemens Klante, Johanna Sjöstedt
Eutrophication and brownification are ongoing environmental problems affecting aquatic ecosystems. Due to anthropogenic changes, increasing amounts of organic and inorganic compounds are entering aquatic systems from surrounding catchment areas, increasing both nutrients, total organic carbon (TOC), and water color with societal, as well as ecological consequences. Several studies have focused on the
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Long-term efficacy of fuel reduction and restoration treatments in Northern Rockies dry forests Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-01-11 Sharon M. Hood, Justin S. Crotteau, Cory C. Cleveland
Fuel and restoration treatments seeking to mitigate the likelihood of uncharacteristic high-severity wildfires in forests with historically frequent, low-severity fire regimes are increasingly common, but long-term treatment effects on fuels, aboveground carbon, plant community structure, ecosystem resilience, and other ecosystem attributes are understudied. We present 20-year responses to thinning
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Ecologically informed priors improve Bayesian model estimates of species richness and occupancy for undetected species Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-01-07 Emily M. Beasley
Detection error can bias observations of ecological processes, especially when some species are never detected during sampling. In many communities, the probable identity of these missing species is known from previous research and natural history collections, but this information is rarely incorporated into subsequent models. Here, I present prior aggregation as a method for including information
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The following article for this Special Feature was published in an earlier Issue Ecol. Appl. (IF 4.3) Pub Date : 2024-01-02
Gu, D., T. Jia, H. Wei, M. Fang, F. Yu, L. Shu, X. Wang, G. Li, X. Cai, X. Mu, M. Xu, J. Wang and Y. Hu. 2023. “Biotic Resistance to Fish Invasions in Southern China: Evidence from Biomass, Habitat, and Fertility Limitation.” Ecological Applications 33(8): e2819. https://doi.org/10.1002/eap.2819. https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/eap.2819