| 1. |
- Bragazza, Luca, et al.
(author)
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Atmospheric nitrogen deposition promotes carbon loss from peat bogs
- 2006
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In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. - : Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. - 0027-8424 .- 1091-6490. ; 103:51, s. 19386-19389
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Peat bogs have historically represented exceptional carbon (C) sinks because of their extremely low decomposition rates and consequent accumulation of plant remnants as peat. Among the factors favoring that peat accumulation, a major role is played by the chemical quality of plant litter itself, which is poor in nutrients and characterized by polyphenols with a strong inhibitory effect on microbial breakdown. Because bogs receive their nutrient supply solely from atmospheric deposition, the global increase of atmospheric nitrogen (N) inputs as a consequence of human activities could potentially alter the litter chemistry with important, but still unknown, effects on their C balance. Here we present data showing the decomposition rates of recently formed litter peat samples collected in nine European countries under a natural gradient of atmospheric N deposition from approximate to 0.2 to 2 g center dot m(-2)center dot yr(-1). We found that enhanced decomposition rates for material accumulated under higher atmospheric N supplies resulted in higher carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and dissolved organic carbon release. The increased IN availability favored microbial decomposition (i) by removing N constraints on microbial metabolism and (ii) through a chemical amelioration of litter peat quality with a positive feedback on microbial enzymatic activity. Although some uncertainty remains about whether decay-resistant Sphagnum will continue to dominate litter peat, our data indicate that, even without such changes, increased N deposition poses a serious risk to our valuable peatland C sinks.
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| 2. |
- Bengtsson, Fia, 1986-, et al.
(author)
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Environmental drivers of Sphagnum growth in peatlands across the Holarctic region
- 2021
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In: Journal of Ecology. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0022-0477 .- 1365-2745. ; 109:1, s. 417-431
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The relative importance of global versus local environmental factors for growth and thus carbon uptake of the bryophyte genusSphagnum-the main peat-former and ecosystem engineer in northern peatlands-remains unclear. We measured length growth and net primary production (NPP) of two abundantSphagnumspecies across 99 Holarctic peatlands. We tested the importance of previously proposed abiotic and biotic drivers for peatland carbon uptake (climate, N deposition, water table depth and vascular plant cover) on these two responses. Employing structural equation models (SEMs), we explored both indirect and direct effects of drivers onSphagnumgrowth. Variation in growth was large, but similar within and between peatlands. Length growth showed a stronger response to predictors than NPP. Moreover, the smaller and denserSphagnum fuscumgrowing on hummocks had weaker responses to climatic variation than the larger and looserSphagnum magellanicumgrowing in the wetter conditions. Growth decreased with increasing vascular plant cover within a site. Between sites, precipitation and temperature increased growth forS. magellanicum. The SEMs indicate that indirect effects are important. For example, vascular plant cover increased with a deeper water table, increased nitrogen deposition, precipitation and temperature. These factors also influencedSphagnumgrowth indirectly by affecting moss shoot density. Synthesis. Our results imply that in a warmer climate,S. magellanicumwill increase length growth as long as precipitation is not reduced, whileS. fuscumis more resistant to decreased precipitation, but also less able to take advantage of increased precipitation and temperature. Such species-specific sensitivity to climate may affect competitive outcomes in a changing environment, and potentially the future carbon sink function of peatlands.
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| 3. |
- Biurrun, Idoia, et al.
(author)
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Benchmarking plant diversity of Palaearctic grasslands and other open habitats
- 2021
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In: Journal of Vegetation Science. - Oxford : John Wiley & Sons. - 1100-9233 .- 1654-1103. ; 32:4
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Journal of Vegetation Science published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of International Association for Vegetation Science.Aims: Understanding fine-grain diversity patterns across large spatial extents is fundamental for macroecological research and biodiversity conservation. Using the GrassPlot database, we provide benchmarks of fine-grain richness values of Palaearctic open habitats for vascular plants, bryophytes, lichens and complete vegetation (i.e., the sum of the former three groups). Location: Palaearctic biogeographic realm. Methods: We used 126,524 plots of eight standard grain sizes from the GrassPlot database: 0.0001, 0.001, 0.01, 0.1, 1, 10, 100 and 1,000 m2 and calculated the mean richness and standard deviations, as well as maximum, minimum, median, and first and third quartiles for each combination of grain size, taxonomic group, biome, region, vegetation type and phytosociological class. Results: Patterns of plant diversity in vegetation types and biomes differ across grain sizes and taxonomic groups. Overall, secondary (mostly semi-natural) grasslands and natural grasslands are the richest vegetation type. The open-access file ”GrassPlot Diversity Benchmarks” and the web tool “GrassPlot Diversity Explorer” are now available online (https://edgg.org/databases/GrasslandDiversityExplorer) and provide more insights into species richness patterns in the Palaearctic open habitats. Conclusions: The GrassPlot Diversity Benchmarks provide high-quality data on species richness in open habitat types across the Palaearctic. These benchmark data can be used in vegetation ecology, macroecology, biodiversity conservation and data quality checking. While the amount of data in the underlying GrassPlot database and their spatial coverage are smaller than in other extensive vegetation-plot databases, species recordings in GrassPlot are on average more complete, making it a valuable complementary data source in macroecology. © 2021 The Authors.
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| 4. |
- Dengler, Jürgen, et al.
(author)
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Ecological Indicator Values for Europe (EIVE) 1.0
- 2023
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In: Vegetation Classification and Survey. - 2683-0671. ; 4, s. 7-29
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Aims: To develop a consistent ecological indicator value system for Europe for five of the main plant niche dimensions: soil moisture (M), soil nitrogen (N), soil reaction (R), light (L) and temperature (T). Study area: Europe (and closely adjacent regions). Methods: We identified 31 indicator value systems for vascular plants in Europe that contained assessments on at least one of the five aforementioned niche dimensions. We rescaled the indicator values of each dimension to a continuous scale, in which 0 represents the minimum and 10 the maximum value present in Europe. Taxon names were harmonised to the Euro+Med Plantbase. For each of the five dimensions, we calculated European values for niche position and niche width by combining the values from the individual EIV systems. Using T values as an example, we externally validated our European indicator values against the median of bioclimatic conditions for global occurrence data of the taxa. Results: In total, we derived European indicator values of niche position and niche width for 14,835 taxa (14,714 for M, 13,748 for N, 14,254 for R, 14,054 for L, 14,496 for T). Relating the obtained values for temperature niche position to the bioclimatic data of species yielded a higher correlation than any of the original EIV systems (r = 0.859). The database: The newly developed Ecological Indicator Values for Europe (EIVE) 1.0, together with all source systems, is available in a flexible, harmonised open access database. Conclusions: EIVE is the most comprehensive ecological indicator value system for European vascular plants to date. The uniform interval scales for niche position and niche width provide new possibilities for ecological and macroecological analyses of vegetation patterns. The developed workflow and documentation will facilitate the future release of updated and expanded versions of EIVE, which may for example include the addition of further taxonomic groups, additional niche dimensions, external validation or regionalisation.
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| 5. |
- Dengler, Juergen, et al.
(author)
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GrassPlot - a database of multi-scale plant diversity in Palaearctic grasslands
- 2018
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In: Phytocoenologia. - : Schweizerbart. - 0340-269X. ; 48:3, s. 331-347
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- GrassPlot is a collaborative vegetation-plot database organised by the Eurasian Dry Grassland Group (EDGG) and listed in the Global Index of Vegetation-Plot Databases (GIVD ID EU-00-003). GrassPlot collects plot records (releves) from grasslands and other open habitats of the Palaearctic biogeographic realm. It focuses on precisely delimited plots of eight standard grain sizes (0.0001; 0.001;... 1,000 m(2)) and on nested-plot series with at least four different grain sizes. The usage of GrassPlot is regulated through Bylaws that intend to balance the interests of data contributors and data users. The current version (v. 1.00) contains data for approximately 170,000 plots of different sizes and 2,800 nested-plot series. The key components are richness data and metadata. However, most included datasets also encompass compositional data. About 14,000 plots have near-complete records of terricolous bryophytes and lichens in addition to vascular plants. At present, GrassPlot contains data from 36 countries throughout the Palaearctic, spread across elevational gradients and major grassland types. GrassPlot with its multi-scale and multi-taxon focus complements the larger international vegetationplot databases, such as the European Vegetation Archive (EVA) and the global database " sPlot". Its main aim is to facilitate studies on the scale-and taxon-dependency of biodiversity patterns and drivers along macroecological gradients. GrassPlot is a dynamic database and will expand through new data collection coordinated by the elected Governing Board. We invite researchers with suitable data to join GrassPlot. Researchers with project ideas addressable with GrassPlot data are welcome to submit proposals to the Governing Board.
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| 6. |
- Dítě, Daniel, et al.
(author)
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Glacial-relict symptoms in the Western Carpathian flora
- 2018
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In: Folia Geobotanica. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1211-9520 .- 1874-9348. ; 53, s. 277-300
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Glacial relicts have been regionally morecommon in glacial than in recent times. A rigorousassessment of which species are indeed glacial relictsis extremely difficult because direct evidence is untraceableor equivocal for many species.We aimed to identifyspecies of theWestern Carpathian flora (vascular plants,bryophytes and terrestrial lichens) that display apparentbiogeographical and ecological symptoms, suggesting awider regional or supra-regional distribution during glacialtimes, or at least before the middle-Holoceneclimate optimum. We worked with the premise thatexemplary relict species should tolerate continentaland/or arctic climates, should have large distributionranges with disjunctions, being regionally rare and ecologicallyconservative nowadays, should be associatedwith habitats that occurred during glacial times (tundra,steppe, peatland, open coniferous forest) and shoulddisplay a restriction of ecological niches in the studyregion. The assessed species were primarily those withboreo-continental or artcic-alpine distribution.We demonstrateda conspicuous gradient of glacial-relict symptoms,with Carex vaginata, Betula nana, Trichophorumpumilum, Nephroma arcticum, Saxifraga hirculus andCladonia stellaris topping the ranking. Based on thearbitrary ranking, 289 taxa can be considered highprobabilityrelicts. For only a minority of them, thereare any phylogeographical and/or palaeoecological dataavailable from the study area. Biogeographical and ecologicalsymptoms of 144 taxa suggest that they retreatedrapidly after the Last Glacial Maximum whereas otherspecies probably retreated later. The first principal componentof biogeographical symptoms sorted speciesfrom circumpolar arctic-alpine species of acidicpeatlands and wet tundra to strongly continental speciesof steppe, steppe-tundra and mineral-rich fens. Thisdifferentiation may mirror the altitudinal zonation ofglacial vegetation in the Western Carpathians.
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| 7. |
- Granath, Gustaf, et al.
(author)
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Environmental and taxonomic controls of carbon and oxygen stable isotope composition in Sphagnum across broad climatic and geographic ranges
- 2018
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In: Biogeosciences. - : Copernicus Publications. - 1726-4170 .- 1726-4189. ; 15:16, s. 5189-5202
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Rain-fed peatlands are dominated by peat mosses (Sphagnum sp.), which for their growth depend on nutrients, water and CO2 uptake from the atmosphere. As the isotopic composition of carbon (C-12(,)13) and oxygen (O-16(,)18) of these Sphagnum mosses are affected by environmental conditions, Sphagnum tissue accumulated in peat constitutes a potential long-term archive that can be used for climate reconstruction. However, there is inadequate understanding of how isotope values are influenced by environmental conditions, which restricts their current use as environmental and palaeoenvironmental indicators. Here we tested (i) to what extent C and O isotopic variation in living tissue of Sphagnum is speciesspecific and associated with local hydrological gradients, climatic gradients (evapotranspiration, temperature, precipitation) and elevation; (ii) whether the C isotopic signature can be a proxy for net primary productivity (NPP) of Sphagnum; and (iii) to what extent Sphagnum tissue delta O-18 tracks the delta O-18 isotope signature of precipitation. In total, we analysed 337 samples from 93 sites across North America and Eurasia us ing two important peat-forming Sphagnum species (S. magellanicum, S. fuscum) common to the Holarctic realm. There were differences in delta C-13 values between species. For S. magellanicum delta C-13 decreased with increasing height above the water table (HWT, R-2 = 17 %) and was positively correlated to productivity (R-2 = 7 %). Together these two variables explained 46 % of the between-site variation in delta C-13 values. For S. fuscum, productivity was the only significant predictor of delta C-13 but had low explanatory power (total R-2 = 6 %). For delta O-18 values, approximately 90 % of the variation was found between sites. Globally modelled annual delta O-18 values in precipitation explained 69 % of the between-site variation in tissue delta O-18. S. magellanicum showed lower delta O-18 enrichment than S. fuscum (-0.83 %0 lower). Elevation and climatic variables were weak predictors of tissue delta O-18 values after controlling for delta O-18 values of the precipitation. To summarize, our study provides evidence for (a) good predictability of tissue delta O-18 values from modelled annual delta O-18 values in precipitation, and (b) the possibility of relating tissue delta C-13 values to HWT and NPP, but this appears to be species-dependent. These results suggest that isotope composition can be used on a large scale for climatic reconstructions but that such models should be species-specific.
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| 8. |
- Idoia Biurrun, Idoia, et al.
(author)
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GrassPlot v. 2.00 – first update on the database of multi-scale plant diversity in Palaearctic grasslands
- 2019
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In: Palaearctic Grasslands. - : Eurasian Dry Grassland Group (EDGG). - 2627-9827. ; :44, s. 26-47
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- GrassPlot is a collaborative vegetation-plot database organised by the Eurasian Dry Grassland Group (EDGG) and listed in the Global Index of Vegetation-Plot Databases (GIVD ID EU-00-003). Following a previous Long Database Report (Dengler et al. 2018, Phytocoenologia 48, 331–347), we provide here the first update on content and functionality of GrassPlot. The current version (GrassPlot v. 2.00) contains a total of 190,673 plots of different grain sizes across 28,171 independent plots, with 4,654 nested-plot series including at least four grain sizes. The database has improved its content as well as its functionality, including addition and harmonization of header data (land use, information on nestedness, structure and ecology) and preparation of species composition data. Currently, GrassPlot data are intensively used for broad-scale analyses of different aspects of alpha and beta diversity in grassland ecosystems.
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| 9. |
- Jiroušek, Martin, et al.
(author)
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Classification of European bog vegetation of the Oxycocco‐Sphagnetea class
- 2022
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In: Applied Vegetation Science. - : Wiley. - 1402-2001 .- 1654-109X. ; 25:1, s. 1-19
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Aims: Classification of European bog vegetation (Oxycocco- Sphagnetea class); iden -tification of diagnostic species for the class and vegetation subgroups (orders and alliances); development of an expert system for automatic classification of vegetation plots; and production of distribution maps of the Oxycocco- Sphagnetea class and its alliances.Location: Europe.Methods: A data set of vegetation- plot records was compiled to include various bog types over most of the European continent. An unsupervised classification (beta- flexible linkage method, Sørensen distance measure) and detrended correspondenceanalysis (DCA) ordination were applied. Formal definitions of syntaxa based on spe -cies presence and covers, and respecting the results of the unsupervised classifica-tion, were developed and included in a classification expert system.Results: The Oxycocco- Sphagnetea class, its two orders (Sphagno- Ericetalia tetralicisand Sphagnetalia medii) and seven compositionally distinct alliances were formally de -fined. In addition to the syntaxa included in EuroVegChecklist, three new alliances were distinguished: Rubo chamaemori- Dicranion elongati (subarctic polygon and palsa mires); Erico mackaianae- Sphagnion papillosi (blanket bogs of the northwestern IberianPeninsula); and Sphagno baltici- Trichophorion cespitosi (boreal bog lawns). The latter alliance is newly described in this article.Conclusions: This first pan- European formalized classification of European bog veg -etation partially followed the system presented in EuroVegChecklist, but suggested three additional alliances. One covers palsa and polygon mires, one covers Iberian bogs with endemics and one fills the syntaxonomical gap for lawn microhabitats in boreal bogs. A classification expert system has been developed, which allows assign -ment of vegetation plots to the types described.
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