Identification of co-occurring Branchinecta fairy shrimp species from encysted embryos using multiplex polymerase chain reaction

Morphological identification of many fairy shrimp species is difficult because distinguishing characters are restricted to adults. We developed two multiplex polymerase chain reaction assays that differentiate among three Branchinecta fairy shrimp with distributional overlap in southern California vernal pools. Two of the species are federally listed as threatened. Molecular identification of Branchinecta from cysts allows for species surveys to be conducted during the dry season, expanding the timeframe for population assessment and providing a less intrusive method of sampling sensitive vernal pool habitats.     

Variation in Aboveground Cover Influences Soil Nitrogen Availability at Fine Spatial Scales Following Severe Fire in Subalpine Conifer Forests

Following fire, fine-scale variation in early successional vegetation and soil nutrients may influence development of ecosystem structure and function. We studied conifer forests burned by stand-replacing wildfire in Greater Yellowstone (Wyoming, USA) to address two questions: (1) How do the variability and spatial structure of aboveground cover and soil nitrogen availability change during the first 4 years following stand-replacing fire? (2) At fine scales (2–20 m), are postfire soil inorganic N pools and fluxes related to aboveground cover? Aboveground cover, soil N pools, and annual net N transformations were measured from 2001 to 2004 using a spatially explicit sampling design in four 0.25-ha plots that burned during summer 2000. Within-stand variability (coefficient of variation) in postfire live vegetative cover declined with time since fire, whereas variability in bare mineral soil, charred litter and fresh litter was greatest 2-3 years postfire. The soil nitrate pool was more variable than the soil ammonium pool, but annual net nitrification was less variable than annual net N mineralization. Spatial structure (quantified by semivariograms) was observed in some aboveground cover variables (for example, graminoids and fresh litter), but there was little spatial structure in soil N variables and no obvious congruence in spatial scales of autocorrelation for soil N and aboveground cover. Significant Spearman correlations (at the sample point) indicated that aboveground cover and soil N were coupled following severe fire, and the dominant influence was from aboveground cover to soil N, rather than from soil N to vegetation. Initial patterns of fire severity and re-vegetation contributed to fine-scale heterogeneity in soil N availability for at least 4 years after severe fire.     

Changes in vernal pool edaphic settings through mitigation at the project and landscape scale

Vernal pool mitigation is a highly controversial process that has been frequently criticized for its inability to adequately replicate the ecosystem functions of the original intact wetlands. We analyzed past mitigation practices in two rapidly growing counties in California's Great Central Valley to determine if mitigation procedures are re-arranging the vernal pool landscape by substituting more common or less ecologically significant pool types (as defined by soil type and geomorphology) for rarer or ecologically richer pool types. Results indicate that most development projects impacting vernal pools conduct at least a portion of their mitigation requirements at a site with similar edaphic settings. However, when examined at a landscape-scale across all development projects, the more common edaphic settings such as Northern Hardpan and Low Terrace pools are increasing while more rare types such as Northern Claypan and Volcanic Mudflow pools are decreasing. Results also show that Drainageway pools, a less-specialized pool type with generally lower species richness, are becoming more common through mitigation. These results are confirmed by an analysis of landscape diversity, which showed that overall landscape diversity was lower at mitigation sites than at project sites. Despite these results, the ecological significance of vernal pool mitigation practices remains unclear for several reasons. The lack of maps showing exact locations of vernal pools at project sites make it difficult to precisely determine vernal pool acreage and distribution among edaphic settings. Additionally, more research is needed to determine precise relationships between edaphic settings and species distributions and the effects of mitigation area management practices on species distribution and persistence.     

Phenology-based,remote sensing of post-burn disturbance windows in rangelands

Wildland fire activity has increased in many parts of the world in recent decades. Ecological disturbance by fire can accelerate ecosystem degradation processes such as erosion due to combustion of vegetation that otherwise provides protective cover to the soil surface. This study employed a novel ecological indicator based on remote sensing of vegetation greenness dynamics (phenology) to estimate variability in the window of time between fire and the reemergence of green vegetation. The indicator was applied as a proxy for short-term, post-fire disturbance windows in rangelands; where a disturbance window is defined as the time required for an ecological or geomorphic process that is altered to return to pre-disturbance levels. We examined variability in the indicator determined for time series of MODIS and AVHRR NDVI remote sensing data for a database of ∼100 historical wildland fires, with associated post-fire reseeding treatments, that burned 1990–2003 in cold desert shrub steppe of the Great Basin and Columbia Plateau of the western USA. The indicator-based estimates of disturbance window length were examined relative to the day of the year that fires burned and seeding treatments to consider effects of contemporary variability in fire regime and management activities in this environment. A key finding was that contemporary changes of increased length of the annual fire season could have indirect effects on ecosystem degradation, as early season fires appeared to result in longer time that soils remained relatively bare of the protective cover of vegetation after fires. Also important was that reemergence of vegetation did not occur more quickly after fire in sites treated with post-fire seeding, which is a strategy commonly employed to accelerate post-fire vegetation recovery and stabilize soil. Future work with the indicator could examine other ecological factors that are dynamic in space and time following disturbance – such as nutrient cycling, carbon storage, microbial community composition, or soil hydrology – as a function of disturbance windows, possibly using simulation modeling and historical wildfire information.     

Responses in plant, soil inorganic and microbial nutrient pools to experimental fire, ash and biomass addition in a woodland savanna

In order to investigate the effects of savanna fires on nutrient cycling a field experiment was carried out in an open woodland savanna of southwest Ethiopia. This involved manipulations of fire, fuel load and ash fertilisation in a fully factorial design, and recording of responses in plants, soil inorganic and microbial nutrient pools up to 1 year after the disturbances. As plant biomass nitrogen (N) was only 3.5% of that in topsoil the N loss in a single fire event was relatively small. The microbial N pool size in the topsoil was similar to the N pool size in the aboveground part of the plants. Soil microbial biomass carbon increased slightly 12 days after the low severity fire, but the effect was transient and was not accompanied by an increase in microbial N. Instead, the soil inorganic N concentration increased strongly 1 day after the fire, remained higher up to 3 months after the fire and probably caused the 40% higher grass biomass in burned than unburned plots, and the similar sized increase in grass nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium pools in the following rainy season. In contrast, broad-leaved herbs showed less strong increments in biomass and nutrient pool sizes. Fire interacted with fuel load, as burning of plots with double plant biomass led to reduced microbial biomass, plant nutrient pools and herb (but not grass) biomass. Low-severity-fire nutrient losses appear to be moderate and may be replenished from natural sources. However, in areas with frequent fires and high grass biomass (fuel) loads, or with late fires, nutrient losses could be much larger and non-sustainable to the persistence of the woodland savanna ecosystem.     

Livestock grazing affects vernal pool specialists more than habitat generalists in montane vernal pools

Questions

Do livestock grazing and seasonal precipitation structure species composition in montane vernal pools? Which grazing and precipitation variables best predict cover of vernal pool specialists and species with broader habitat requirements? Is vernal pool species diversity correlated with livestock exclosure, and at what spatial scales?

Location

Montane vernal pools, northeast California, USA.

Methods

Vegetation was sampled in 20 vernal pools, including pools where livestock had been excluded for up to 20 years We compared plant species composition, functional group composition and species diversity among sites that varied in grazing history and seasonal precipitation using CCA and LMM.

Results

Although vernal pool specialists were dominant in montane vernal pools, over a third of plant cover was comprised of species that occur over a broad range of wetland or upland environments. The species composition of vernal pool plant communities was influenced by both livestock grazing and precipitation patterns, however the relative effects of these environmental variables differed by functional group. Livestock exclosures favoured perennial vernal pool specialists over annual vernal pool specialists. In contrast, the cover of habitat generalists was more strongly influenced by seasonal precipitation than livestock grazing. At small spatial scales, species richness and diversity decreased as the number of years a pool had been fenced increased, but this relationship was not significant at a larger spatial scale.

Conclusions

Both livestock grazing and seasonal precipitation structure the montane vernal pool plant community. We found that livestock grazing promotes the cover of annual vernal pool specialists, but at the expense of perennial vernal pool specialists. Wetter vernal pools, however, support higher cover of wetland generalist species regardless of whether pools are grazed.     

Fire effects on ecosystem nitrogen cycling in a Californian bishop pine forest

Fire can cause severe nitrogen (N) losses from grassland, chaparral, and temperate and boreal forest ecosystems. Paradoxically, soil ammonium levels are markedly increased by fire, resulting in high rates of primary production in re-establishing plant communities. In a manipulative experiment, we examined the influence of wild-fire ash residues on soil, microbial and plant N pools in a recently burned Californian bishop pine (Pinus muricata D. Don) forest. Ash stimulated post-fire primary production and ecosystem N retention through direct N inputs from ash to soils, as well as indirect ash effects on soil N availability to plants. These results suggest that redistribution of surface ash after fire by wind or water may cause substantial heterogeneity in soil N availability to plants, and could be an important mechanism contributing to vegetation patchiness in fire-prone ecosystems. In addition, we investigated the impact of fire on ecosystem N cycling by comparing ¹⁵N natural abundance values from recently burned and nearby unburned P. muricata forest communities. At the burned site, ¹⁵N natural abundance in recolonising species was similar to that in bulk soil organic matter. By contrast, there was a marked ¹⁵N depletion in the same species relative to the total soil N pool at the unburned site. These results suggest that plant uptake of nitrate (which tends to be strongly depleted in ¹⁵N because of fractionation during nitrification) is low in recently burned forest communities but could be an important component of eco- system N cycling in mature conifer stands. Received: 29 June 1999 / Accepted: 24 October 1999     

Vernal nitrogen and phosphorus retention by forest understory vegetation and soil microbes

Northern hardwood forests experience annual maximal loss of nutrients during spring. The vernal dam hypothesis predicts that spring ephemeral herbs in northern hardwood forests serve as sinks for nutrients during this season and reduce the loss of nutrients from the terrestrial ecosystem. Soil microbes of northern hardwood forests also sequester nutrients during spring. We compared the vernal nutrient acquisition ability of a soil microbial community and an understory plant community with species of mixed leaf phenology. We monitored nitrogen and phosphorus pool sizes in understory vegetation and soil microbes during spring from 1999 through 2001 in a northern hardwood forest in the Catskill Mountains, New York. Vegetation nutrient content increased during two spring seasons by an average of 3.07 g N m^–2 and 0.19 g P m^–2 and decreased during one spring by 0.81 g N m^–2 and 0.10 g P m^–2. Evergreen, wintergreen, and deciduous plant species were able to sequester nutrients during spring. Soil microbial nutrient content decreased during one spring by 1.29 g N m^–2 and remained constant during the other two springs. Streamwater nitrogen losses were not correlated with biotic nutrient uptake suggesting a temporal disconnect between the two processes. We conclude that understory vegetation is a larger potential sink for vernal nutrients than are soil microbes in this northern hardwood forest and understory and species representing multiple phenologies are capable of vernal nutrient uptake.     

Cattle waste reduces plant diversity in vernal pool mesocosms

In California, much of the remaining vernal pool habitat is used for cattle grazing. Some studies suggest that grazing helps promote native plant diversity on grasslands, but the impact of grazing on plants that reside in pool basins is largely unknown. We investigated how one aspect of cattle grazing, the deposition of waste, affects these plant species by adding dung and urine to mesocosms lined with vernal pool soil. As a result of dung input, orthophosphate, conductivity, and turbidity increased in our mesocosms while dissolved oxygen decreased. Such changes in water quality are consistent with a shift toward a eutrophic state. Algal biomass and percent-cover also increased in dung-treated mesocosms. When the mesocosms dried, vascular plant species richness and percent-cover in dung-treated mesocosms were reduced by up to 54% and 87%, respectively. We attribute this to light attenuation by algal mats that flourished in the nutrient-enriched water. We also found that dung input caused significant, but weak, shifts in the composition of the vascular plant community. We conclude that cattle grazing may be detrimental to plant communities in vernal pools via increased nutrient loading, which promotes algal growth. Any beneficial effects of grazing may thus be limited to the surrounding grassland. Studies that examine the regional-scale impacts of grazing on vernal pool grasslands should separately consider the impacts to local-scale (i.e., within-pool) plant diversity, as most of the threatened and endangered plant species of California vernal pools reside primarily in pool basins.     

Fire effects on the soil seed bank and post‐fire resilience of a semi‐arid shrubland in central Argentina

Soil seed bank is an important source of resilience of plant communities who suffered disturbances. We analysed the effect of an intense fire in the soil seed bank of a semi‐arid shrubland of Córdoba Argentina. We asked if the fire affected seed abundance, floristic and functional composition of the soil seed bank at two different layers (0–5 cm and 5–10 cm), and if fire could compromise the role of the soil seed bank as a source of resilience for the vegetation. We collected soil samples from a burned site and from a control site that had not burned. Samples were installed in a greenhouse under controlled conditions. During 12 months, we recorded all germinated seedlings. We compare soil seed bank with pre‐fire vegetation in terms of floristic and functional composition. The high‐intensity fire deeply affected the abundance of seeds in the soil, but it did not affect its floristic or functional composition. Floristic and functional composition of soil seed banks – at burned and unburned sites‐ differed markedly from that of the pre‐fire vegetation, although a previous study at the same site indicated high resilience after fire of this plant community. Our results indicate that resilience of this system is not strongly dependent on direct germination from seeds buried in the soil. Other sources of resilience, like colonization from neighbouring vegetation patches and resprouting from underground organs appear to gain relevance after an intense fire.     

Low‐severity fire as a mechanism of organic matter protection in global peatlands: Thermal alteration slows decomposition

Worldwide, regularly recurring wildfires shape many peatland ecosystems to the extent that fire‐adapted species often dominate plant communities, suggesting that wildfire is an integral part of peatland ecology rather than an anomaly. The most destructive blazes are smoldering fires that are usually initiated in periods of drought and can combust entire peatland carbon stores. However, peatland wildfires more typically occur as low‐severity surface burns that arise in the dormant season when vegetation is desiccated, and soil moisture is high. In such low‐severity fires, surface layers experience flash heating, but there is little loss of underlying peat to combustion. This study examines the potential importance of such processes in several peatlands that span a gradient from hemiboreal to tropical ecozones and experience a wide range of fire return intervals. We show that low‐severity fires can increase the pool of stable soil carbon by thermally altering the chemistry of soil organic matter (SOM), thereby reducing rates of microbial respiration. Using X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy and Fourier transform infrared, we demonstrate that low‐severity fires significantly increase the degree of carbon condensation and aromatization of SOM functional groups, particularly on the surface of peat aggregates. Laboratory incubations show lower CO₂ emissions from peat subjected to low‐severity fire and predict lower cumulative CO₂ emissions from burned peat after 1–3 years. Also, low‐severity fires reduce the temperature sensitivity (Q₁₀) of peat, indicating that these fires can inhibit microbial access to SOM. The increased stability of thermally altered SOM may allow a greater proportion of organic matter to survive vertical migration into saturated and anaerobic zones of peatlands where environmental conditions physiochemically protect carbon stores from decomposition for thousands of years. Thus, across latitudes, low‐severity fire is an overlooked factor influencing carbon cycling in peatlands, which is relevant to global carbon budgets as climate change alters fire regimes worldwide.     

林火干扰对广东木荷林生态系统碳库的影响

森林碳库在调节CO₂浓度及减缓温室效应中发挥重要作用。选择广东木荷林为研究对象,通过相邻样地法,进行植被生物量、凋落物生物量和土壤样品的采样与分析,研究不同林火干扰强度对生态系统各碳库(植被、凋落物和土壤有机碳)及生态系统碳库产生的变化规律和空间分布格局及其影响因素。结果表明:(1)植被碳密度随着林火干扰强度增强而减少,但不同组分的植被碳密度表现不同,乔木碳密度在不同林火干扰强度下变化与植被碳密度变化一致,而草本碳密度则呈现相反的变化趋势。相同林火干扰强度下,植被各组分碳密度均以乔木层降低幅度最大。林火干扰均显著降低了凋落物碳密度(P<0.05),并随林火干扰强度的增加其降低幅度增大,但不同林火干扰强度对凋落物碳密度的影响有所差异。林火干扰降低了土壤有机碳密度,且降低幅度随土层深度增加而逐渐变小。(2)林火干扰有效改变了生态系统碳库的空间分布格局。对照样地木荷林土壤有机碳库占比为61.59%,重度林火干扰后,土壤有机碳库占比为70.96%呈上升趋势,占生态系统碳库的优势地位,而植被和凋落物碳库占比呈下降趋势,处于生态系统碳库的次要地位。(3)双因素方差分析表明,林火干扰强度和土层深度及其交互作用均对土壤有机碳密度有显著影响。林火干扰强度解释了土壤有机碳密度变异的8.78%,土层深度解释了土壤有机碳密度变异的70.29%,林火干扰强度和土层深度之间的交互作用解释了土壤有机碳密度变异的8.16%。研究发现:林火干扰降低了生态系统碳库,且随林火干扰强度增加,生态系统碳库减少幅度增大。轻度林火干扰对森林生态系统碳库的影响差异不显著,而中度和重度林火干扰对森林生态系统碳库的影响差异显著。研究结果对深化亚热带森林固碳效应的影响机制提供理论支撑。     

Protecting vernal pools: a model from Massachusetts,USA

Ephemeral ponded wetlands, often referred to as vernal pools in the wetland’s lexicon of the northeastern United States, are in need of protection from outright loss, catastrophic alteration, and disruption of natural processes in the surrounding landscape, because of their great importance to a characteristic wildlife fauna. The state of Massachusetts, USA provides a useful model for vernal pool protection. Vernal pools have been specifically protected under state wetlands regulations since 1987 and many of the state’s municipalities have added additional, more stringent protection under local wetland bylaws. Some vernal pools are also protected under federal wetlands protection law. The protection of vernal pools in Massachusetts is based on a certification process in which biological data are collected to demonstrate that a wetland provides vernal pool functions. Once certified, and if a pool meets jurisdictional requirements, regulatory restrictions are placed on development and other activities proposed within the pool. The regulatory protection for vernal pools in Massachusetts has resulted in the prevention of outright loss and degradation of many vernal pools across the state. However, a 2001 US Supreme Court decision, referred to as the SWANCC decision, may result in a loss of federal jurisdiction over many vernal pools, protection that is especially valuable for pools that do not meet state regulatory criteria. Of significant importance is a lack of protection in existing regulations of the upland non-breeding habitat surrounding vernal pools, which has been shown to be of critical importance to the animals that rely on the pools. Despite the shortcomings of the regulatory protection model in Massachusetts, it has been especially effective as a catalyst for environmental and wildlife awareness, public participation in the wetlands regulatory process, and as an extremely valuable tool in environmental education and outreach.     

Ecosystem Carbon Remains Low for Three Decades Following Fire and Constrains Soil CO2 Responses to Precipitation in Southwestern Ponderosa Pine Forests

The fire regime of ponderosa pine forests in the southwestern United States has shifted over the past century from historically frequent, low-intensity surface fires to infrequent, stand-replacing crown fires. We quantified plant and soil carbon (C) responses to this new fire regime and assessed interactions between changes in fire regime and changes in precipitation regime predicted by some climate models (specifically, an earlier monsoon rain season). We hypothesized that soil C pools and carbon dioxide (CO₂) efflux rates would decrease initially following stand-replacing fires (due to low plant C inputs and the loss of the soil surficial organic (O) horizon), but then increase with time-after-fire (as plant C inputs increase). Water availability often limits soil biological activity in these forests, but we predicted that low soil C availability following fire would constrain soil CO₂ efflux responses to precipitation. In a series of sites with histories of stand-replacing fires that burned between 2 and 34?years prior to sampling, burned patches had lower soil C pools and fluxes than adjacent unburned patches, but there was no evidence of a trend with time-after-fire. Burned forests had 7,500?g C m^?2 less live plant biomass C (P?<?0.001), 1,600?g C m^?2 less soil total C (P?<?0.001) and 90?g C m^?2 less soil labile C (P?<?0.001) than unburned forests. Lower soil labile C in burned patches was due to both a loss of O horizon mass with fire and lower labile C concentrations (g labile C kg^?1 soil total C) in the mineral soil. During the annual drought that precedes summer monsoon rains, both burned and unburned patches had soil CO₂ efflux rates ranging from 0.9 to 1.1?g CO₂-C m^?2 day^?1. During the monsoon season, soil CO₂ efflux in unburned patches increased to approximately 4.8?g CO₂-C m^?2 day^?1 and rates in paired burned patches (3.4?g CO₂-C m^?2 day^?1) were lower (P?<?0.001). We also used field irrigation to experimentally create an earlier and longer monsoon season, and soil CO₂ efflux rates at both burned and unburned plots increased initially in response to watering, but decreased to below control (plots without irrigation) rates within weeks. Watering did not significantly change cumulative growing season soil CO₂ efflux, supporting our prediction that C availability constrains soil CO₂ efflux responses to precipitation. This research advances our understanding of interactions among climate, fire, and C in southwestern forests, suggesting that climate-induced shifts toward more stand-replacing fires will decrease soil C for decades, such that a single fire can constrain future soil biological responses to precipitation regime changes.     

Spatial heterogeneity of understory vegetation and soil in an Alaskan upland boreal forest fire chronosequence

In this study we characterized spatial heterogeneity of soil carbon and nitrogen pools, soil moisture, and soil pH of the first 15?cm of the soil profile; depth of the organic horizon; forest floor covers; and understory vegetation abundances in three sites (1999, 1987 and 1920 wildfires) of a boreal forest chronosequence of interior Alaska. We also investigated the cross-dependence between understory vegetation distribution and soil characteristics. Our results showed higher microbial respiration rates and microbial biomass in the oldest site and greater net N mineralization rates in the mid-successional site. Although spatial heterogeneity was absent at the scale studied for the majority of soil variables (60%), understory vegetation abundances and forest floor cover, spatial heterogeneity decreased with time after fire for the depth of organic horizon, soil microbial biomass, N mineralization rates and feathermoss cover. Our results also showed that increasing time after fire decreased the number of correlations between understory vegetation and soil characteristics while it increased between forest floor covers and soil characteristics. Overall, our study suggest that fire initially creates a patchy mosaic of forest floor cover, from fire hot spots, where high intensity burning exposes mineral soil, to practically unburned areas with intact mosses and lichens. As time since fire passes, forest floor cover and soil characteristics tend to become more uniform as understory species fill in severely burned areas.     

Ecosystem-level effects of bioturbation by the tadpole shrimp <Emphasis Type="Italic">Lepidurus packardi</Emphasis> in temporary pond mesocosms

An example of ecosystem engineering gaining attention in aquatic systems is bioturbation, the disruption of sediment at the water–sediment interface due to burrowing and foraging. One consequence of bioturbation can be increased turbidity from suspended sediment, which generally inhibits macrophyte growth and reduces ecosystem functioning. Conversely, bioturbation may promote invertebrate species richness by unearthing dormant cysts. Temporary-pond crustaceans are not widely regarded as agents of bioturbation, but on the basis of aquaria observations we hypothesized that certain taxa can disturb the sediment and create highly turbid water. We tested this hypothesis by removing crustaceans from mesocosms lined with vernal pool soil. Compared to this treatment group, mesocosms containing crustaceans had extremely high turbidity from suspended sediment, as well as reduced total macrophyte cover. We also found clear compositional differences in macrophyte communities between treatments, driven largely by differences in water physicochemistry, including turbidity. Regression analysis linked most of the bioturbation to the endangered notostracan Lepidurus packardi Simon 1886, which was a strong predictor of turbidity in our mesocosms. We also found a trend toward increased crustacean species richness in our mesocosms in the presence of this taxon. An analysis of published data from King et al. (1996) suggests that this trend may extend to natural vernal pools. Overall, our results suggest that L. packardi may have large effects on vernal pool communities, likely mediated in part through its disturbing of the sediment.     

Biogeochemical Hotspots in Forested Landscapes: The Role of Vernal Pools in Denitrification and Organic Matter Processing

Quantifying spatial and temporal heterogeneity in ecosystem processes presents a challenge for conserving ecosystem function across landscapes. In particular, many ecosystems contain small features that play larger roles in ecosystem processes than their size would indicate; thus, they may represent “hotspots” of activity relative to their surroundings. Biogeochemical hotspots are characterized as small features within a landscape that show comparatively high chemical reaction rates. In northeastern forests in North America, vernal pools are abundant, small features that typically fill in spring with snow melt and precipitation and dry by the end of summer. Ephemeral flooding alters soil moisture and the depth of the soil’s oxic/anoxic boundary, which may affect biogeochemical processes. We studied the effects of vernal pools on leaf-litter decomposition rates, soil enzyme activity, and denitrification in vernal pools to assess whether they function as biogeochemical hotspots. Our results indicate that seasonal inundation enhanced leaf-litter decomposition, denitrification, and enzyme activity in vernal pools relative to adjacent forest sites. Leaves in seasonally flooded areas decomposed faster than leaves in terra firme forest sites. Flooding also influenced the C, N, and P stoichiometry of decomposing leaf litter and explained the variance in microbial extracellular enzyme activity for phosphatase, β-d-glucosidase, and β-N-acetylglucosaminidase. Additionally, denitrification rates were enhanced by seasonal flooding across all of the study pools. Collectively, these data suggest that vernal pool ecosystems may function as hotspots of leaf-litter decomposition and denitrification and play a significant role in decomposition and nutrient dynamics relative to their size.     

Loss of biodiversity and hydrologic function in seasonal wetlands persists over 10 years of livestock grazing removal

Ecological restoration provides a means to increase biodiversity in ecosystems degraded by natural and human‐induced changes. In some systems, disturbances such as grazing can be key factors in the successful restoration of biodiversity and ecological function, but few studies have addressed this experimentally, especially over long time periods and at landscape scales. In this study, we excluded livestock grazing from plots within a grassland landscape containing vernal pools in the Central Valley of California for 10 years and compared vernal pool hydrology and plant community composition with areas grazed under an historic regime. In all 10 years, the relative cover of native plant species remained between 5 and 20% higher in the grazed versus ungrazed plots. This effect was particularly prominent on the pool edges, though evidence of invasion into the pool basins was evident later in the study. Native species richness was lower in the ungrazed plots with 10–20% fewer native species found in ungrazed versus grazed plots in all years except the first year of treatment. Ungrazed pools held water for a shorter period of time than pools grazed under an historic regime. By the ninth year of the study, ungrazed pools took up to 2 weeks longer to fill and dried down 1–2 weeks sooner at the end of the rainy season compared to grazed pools. The results of this study confirm that livestock grazing plays a key role in maintaining biodiversity and ecosystem function in vernal pools.     

Comparing amphibian habitat quality and functional success among natural,restored, and created vernal pools

The fact that several vernal pool restoration and creation attempts in eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey have been paired with conservation of natural pools in the same area provided a valuable research opportunity to compare amphibian habitat quality between project sites and natural reference pools. To measure desired outcomes, we used successful reproduction and metamorphosis of two vernal pool indicator species, the wood frog and spotted salamander. Although many previous studies indicate that restored and created pools rarely replace function lost in the destruction of natural pools, success of vernal pool indicator species was not necessarily related to pool type in this study. Results indicate a strong correlation between reproductive success for both species and vernal pool size (i.e. mean depth and volume), regardless of pool type. Although overall survival rates of wood frog larvae were significantly higher in natural pools with hydroperiods between 12 and 35 weeks, wood frogs were also successful in one restored and one created vernal pool. Salamander survival rates were highest in two natural and two created pools, which had in common both greater volumes and higher proportions of forest land cover in the surrounding 1,000 m. The documented success of vernal pool indicator species in two well‐established created pools demonstrates that pool creation can sometimes restore communities and ecological functions lost, especially when nearby natural pools are degraded or destroyed.