Experiment 014 - Successional Dynamics on a Resampled Chronosequence
Introduction
The purpose of this observational study is to describe the dynamics of ecosystem succession. The change in the number, type, and amount of plant and grazing animal species is monitored in more than 20 fields. These fields were previously cultivated, but then abandoned from agriculture at various times in the past. The fields were left undisturbed for plants to develop from seeds within the soil or brought into the fields by wind or animals. Permanent transects have been established in these abandoned fields for purposes of sampling in a consistent location from year to year. Permanent plots along these transects have been used to sample soil nutrients, (in particular, nitrogen) abundance of vegetation, species composition and herbivore populations. The sampling occurs approximately every 6 years. In the initial survey, 100 quadrats of size 1 by 0.5 m were sampled per field in 23 different fields. Abandoned fields included in E014 are 4, 5, 10, 21, 24, 26, 27, 28, 32, 35, 39, 40, 41, 44, 45, 47, 53, 70, 72, 76, 77. Fields 22(B), 29(A), and 69(C) were originally included in E014 but used for other purposes shortly after the start of the study. This experiment was established in 1983 and 1989 by principal investigators Johannes Knops and David Tilman.
Past work at CDR and elsewhere has demonstrated an overriding influence of fire frequency in maintaining prairie openings and oak savanna at the prairie-forest border. Fire regimes harm some types of species while favoring others and drive light and nutrient dynamics, which in turn drive community functional attributes and diversity levels. Ultimately, fire frequency interacts with climate, N deposition, land use, and biotic invasion to determine the outcomes of tree-grass interactions and the dynamics of vegetation at ecotones such as the prairie-forest border in Minnesota.
In 2006 each field was divided in half, and one half randomly chosen for periodic prescribed burning (a fire every other year). We anticipate that the burned half will continue succession to prairie grassland while the unburned half will become white pine stands if seed sources are nearby, or will otherwise undergo extremely slow succession to oaks.
Key Findings
Datasets for e014: Successional Dynamics on a Resampled Chronosequence
Dataset ID | Title | Range of Years (# years with data) |
---|---|---|
ghe014 | Core Old Field Grasshopper Sampling | 1989-2006 (18 years) |
hte014 | Maximum plant height along transects | 1984-1984 (1 year) |
mre014 | Nitrogen mineralization rate | 1986-1986 (1 year) |
lpe014 | Percent light penetration | 1984-1989 (2 years) |
pce014 | Plant species percent cover data | 1983-2016 (8 years) |
she014 | Shrub data | 2006-2006 (1 year) |
mse014 | Small mammal abundance | 1983-1985 (3 years) |
care014 | Soil carbon | 1983-2007 (5 years) |
ne014 | Soil nitrogen | 1983-2007 (5 years) |
ome014 | Soil organic matter | 1983-1983 (1 year) |
phe014 | Soil pH | 1983-1983 (1 year) |
abwe014 | Supplemental Old Field Grasshopper Sampling | 1989-2006 (17 years) |
Selected Recent Publications
Yang, Y., D. Tilman, G. Furey, and C. Lehman. 2019. Soil carbon sequestration accelerated by restoration of grassland biodiversity. Nature communications 10:718. DOI 10.1038/s41467-019-08636-w 2019 e014 e054 e120 e248
Clark, A. T., J. M. H. Knops and D. Tilman (2018). "Contingent factors explain average divergence in functional composition over 88 years of old field succession." Journal of Ecology. DOI 10.1111/1365-2745.13070 2018 e014
Sullivan, L. L., A. T. Clark, D. Tilman and A. K. Shaw (2018). "Mechanistically derived dispersal kernels explain species-level patterns of recruitment and succession." Ecology 99(11): 2415-2420. 2018 e014 e120
Ladwig, L. M., Ratajczak, Z. R., Ocheltree, T. W., Hafich, K. A., Churchill, A. C., Frey, S. J. K., Fuss, C. B., Kazanski, C. E., Munoz, J. D., Petrie, M. D., Reinmann, A. B. and Smith, J. G. (2016). "Beyond arctic and alpine: the influence of winter climate on temperate ecosystems." Ecology 97(2): 372-382. 2016 [Full Text] e001 e014 e080
Jain, Meha; Flynn, Dan F. B.; Prager, Case M.; Hart, Georgia M.; DeVan, Caroline M.; Ahrestani, Farshid S.; Palmer, Matthew I.; Bunker, Daniel E.; Knops, Johannes M. H.; Jouseau, Claire F.; Naeem, Shahid; The importance of rare species: a trait-based assessment of rare species contributions to functional diversity and possible ecosystem function in tall-grass prairies; Ecology and Evolution, 2014, 4, 1, 104-112 DOI 10.1002/ece3.915 2014 [Full Text] e014