Find research datasets worth reusing

Moss establishment in restoration: the role of moss production method and short-term benefits of abscisic acid

Mosses may be useful in ecological restoration activities but are excluded from most native plant materials programs. Recent efforts have attempted to propagate mosses in controlled environments for deployment to boost the recovery of degraded field sites. Field re-entry and establishment have proven challenging, possibly because the moss materials are not field-ready. We compared the field establishment rates of mosses of the same species propagated using three methodologies carried out either in greenhouses or outdoors. In an attempt to chemically boost field-readiness, we amended each with either sucrose, an osmoprotectant, or abscisic acid, a stress response phytohormone, or neither. Mosses grown outdoors with only one initial fall irrigation event lost at least 30% less cover than outdoor-grown moss that was irrigated in spring and moss tissue grown in a fog chamber inside of a greenhouse. The addition of abscisic acid also induced a subtle difference, leading to about 10% less cover loss compared to controls. Ultimately, all treatments declined to only trace level moss cover at most after three years. From these results, we put forward the working hypothesis that growing methodologies more similar to field conditions and exposing mosses to environmental fluctuations are more likely to produce field-ready moss materials. Abscisic acid addition is promising as a way to delay the mortality of mosses introduced into a desiccating environment. To translate short-term relative differences to long-term success, these practices may need to be combined with techniques that reduce the stress experienced in the field.

Dietary flavanols restore hippocampal-dependent memory in older adults with lower diet quality and habitual flavanol consumption

Dietary flavanols are food constituents found in certain fruits and vegetables that have been linked to cognitive aging. Previous studies suggested that consumption of dietary flavanols might specifically be linked to the hippocampal-dependent memory component of cognitive aging and that memory benefits of a flavanol intervention might depend on habitual diet quality. Here, we tested these hypotheses in the context of a large-scale study of 3,562 older adults, who were randomly assigned to a 3-y intervention of cocoa extract (500 mg of cocoa flavanols per day) or a placebo [(COcoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study) COSMOS-Web, NCT04582617]. Using the alternative healthy eating index in all participants and a urine-based biomarker of flavanol intake in a subset of participants [n = 1,361], we show that habitual flavanol consumption and diet quality at baseline are positively and selectively correlated with hippocampal-dependent memory. While the prespecified primary endpoint testing for an intervention-related improvement in memory in all participants after 1 y was not statistically significant, the flavanol intervention restored memory among participants in lower tertiles of habitual diet quality or habitual flavanol consumption. Increases in the flavanol biomarker over the course of the trial were associated with improving memory. Collectively, our results allow dietary flavanols to be considered in the context of a depletion–repletion paradigm and suggest that low flavanol consumption can act as a driver of the hippocampal-dependent component of cognitive aging.

Prescribed fire is an effective restoration measure for increasing boreal fungal diversity

Intensive forestry practices have had a negative impact on boreal forest biodiversity, subsequently, the need for restoration is pressing. Polypores (wood-inhabiting fungi) are key decomposers of dead-wood, but due to the lack of coarse woody debris (CWD) in forest ecosystems, many species are threatened. Here, we study the long-term effects on polypore diversity of two restoration treatments; creating CWD by felling whole trees and prescribed burning. This large-scale experiment is located in spruce-dominated boreal forests in southern Finland. The experiment has a factorial design (n=3) including three levels of created CWD (5, 30 and 60 m3 ha-1) crossed with burning or no burning. In 2018, 16 years after the initiation, we inventoried polypores on ten experimentally cut logs and ten naturally fallen logs per stand. We found that overall polypore community composition differed between burned and unburned stands. However, only red-listed species' abundances and richness were positively affected by prescribed burning. We found no effects of CWD levels created mechanically by felling of trees. We show, for the first time, that prescribed burning is an effective measure for restoring polypore diversity in late-successional Norway spruce forest. Burning creates CWD with certain characteristics that differ from what is created by CWD-restoration by felling trees. Prescribed burning promotes primarily red-listed species, demonstrating its effectiveness as a restoration measure to promote diversity of threatened polypore species in boreal forest. However, as the CWD that the burning creates will decrease over time, to be functional, prescribed burns need to be applied regularly at the landscape scale. Large-scale and long-term experimental studies, such as this one, are invaluable for establishing evidence-based restoration strategies.

Restoration temporarily supports the resilience of sagebrush-steppe ecosystems subjected to repeated fires

Many ecosystems are experiencing increased fire frequencies and species invasions that can erode their resilience and cause a shift to alternative states. In the sagebrush-steppe, a semi-arid shrubland ecosystem in North America, restoration treatments are often implemented following wildfire to enhance their resilience to invasion. However, little is known about the long-term effectiveness of these treatments. We investigated whether repeated restoration efforts provide greater resilience in sagebrush-steppe communities initially dominated by species with different post-fire regeneration traits and subjected to compounding wildfires and invasion by Bromus tectorum over 25 years. We studied 37 permanent transects (Columbia Basin, Washington, USA) in which species abundance was recorded multiple times from 1992 to 2017. We quantified community change and its relationship with fire, restoration, and moisture availability. Resilience was evaluated by quantifying community resistance and stability indices. The greatest change occurred in communities where the obligate seeding shrub Artemisia tridentata was initially common. Repeated fires led to the extirpation of this shrub and eventual dominance of B. tectorum. Herbicide applications temporarily suppressed B. tectorum post-fire. Seeding treatments and above average precipitation initially increased native cover. Although communities where resprouting species were common showed the least change, repeated fires did lead to a gradual but substantial decline (86%) in resprouting shrubs. Synthesis and applications: Our findings show that repeated restoration efforts, together with elevated precipitation, can support native species re-establishment in systems experiencing altered disturbance regimes and species invasions. Our unique long-term dataset demonstrates, however, that many such interventions have short-lived effects due to the strong "unhelpful resilience" of highly invaded systems. This implicitly suggests that many such systems have experienced fundamental shifts in ecosystem state. The likelihood of this occurring is strongly associated with the dominant species post-fire regeneration traits. We predict that community composition and resilience will continue to degrade in the sagebrush-steppe unless management prioritizes fire suppression and an adaptive restoration approach that considers resource availability.

opencc-zeroJun 2023View details →

Functional-trait based restoration alters nutrient cycling and invasion rates in Hawaiian lowland wet forest

Many degraded ecosystems have altered nutrient dynamics, due to invaders possessing a suite of traits that allow them to both outcompete native species and alter the environment. In ecosystems where invasive species have increased nutrient turnover rates, it can be difficult to reduce nutrient availability. This study examined whether a functional-trait-based restoration approach, involving the planting of species with conservative nutrient-use traits, can slow rates of nutrient cycling and consequently reduce rates of invasion. We examined a functional trait restoration initiative in a heavily-invaded lowland wet forest site in Hilo, Hawai'i. Native and introduced species were chosen to create four experimental hybrid forest communities, in comparison to the invaded forest, with a factorial design in which communities varied in rates of carbon turnover (slow or moderate [SLOW, MOD]), and in the relationship of species in trait space (redundant or complementary [RED, COMP]). After the first five years, we evaluated community-level outcomes related to nutrient cycling: carbon (C), nitrogen (N), and phosphorus (P) via litterfall, litter decomposition, and also outplant productivity and rates of invasion. We found that: (1) regardless of treatment, the experimental communities had low rates of nutrient cycling through litterfall relative to the invaded reference forest, (2) the MOD communities had greater nutrient release via litterfall than the SLOW communities, (3) introduced species had greater nutrient release than native species in the two MOD experimental communities, and (4) within treatments, there was a positive relationship between nutrient levels and outplant basal area, but outplant basal area was negatively associated with rates of invasion. The negative relationships among basal area and weed invasion, particularly for the two COMP treatments, suggest species existing in different parts of trait space may help confer some degree of invasion resistance. The diversification of trait space was facilitated by the use of introduced species; a new concept in Hawaiian forest management. Although challenges remain in endeavors to restore this heavily degraded ecosystem, this study provides evidence that functional trait-based restoration approaches using carefully crafted hybrid communities can reduce rates of nutrient cycling and invasion in order to reach management goals.

opencc-zeroJun 2023View details →

Large-scale restoration of species-rich dry grasslands on arable land: Environmental filtering drives successful species establishment over a period of 10 years

Sowing of regionally specific seed mixtures on former arable land is increasingly used to restore species-rich grasslands, but it often faces important obstacles in environmental conditions and colonisation from preserved surrounding grasslands. Long-term landscape scale studies, which explore the processes governing plant establishment from seed mixtures and later colonisation from the surrounding landscape are scarce. We studied the species and functional trait composition of 32 grasslands restored 1–11 years before the first sampling by sowing regional seed mixtures in the White Carpathian Mts (SE Czech Republic). We compared them with 23 well-preserved permanent grasslands in their surroundings. In each grassland we estimated plant species cover in three plots of 25 m2, in restored grasslands in 2009, 2014 and 2019, in permanent grasslands in 2009. The species composition of the restored grasslands converged towards the permanent grasslands due to expansion of dry grassland species and retreat of mesic grassland and weed species. The majority (60–71%) of the vegetation cover of restored grasslands was formed by sown species, while the species number was mainly determined by colonising unsown species (61–63%). The species number of restored grasslands remained lower than that in permanent grasslands. Functional trait composition (Community Weighted Mean) of the sown seed mixtures, permanent grasslands and restored grasslands overlapped in all three samplings. With increasing grassland age, species with resource-retaining traits of low specific leaf area and high leaf dry matter content, lower stature, higher seed mass, and lower capacity for clonal reproduction expanded. Functional trait diversity of the plots was mostly lower than expected by null model randomisations of community, which indicates strong environmental filtering. Comparison of newly colonising species and extinct species indicated that mainly species with traits similar to the rest of the community are able to colonise the grasslands successfully. Synthesis and applications. Sowing of regionally specific seed mixtures was successful and demonstrated to be a fast way of grassland restoration, particularly in terms of functional trait composition. The resulting species diversity depended on the colonisation processes, which are controlled by the functional composition of the local communities.

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Data set for Dynamic Service Restoration of Distribution Networks with Volt-Var Devices, Distributed Energy Resources, and Energy Storage Systems

Two power distribution systems are presented. The first system consists of 53 nodes and 61 branches, while the second system consists of 404 buses and 430 branches. Both distribution systems offer extensive applications in problems related to multi-time service restoration, Volt/Var devices, and distributed energy resource operation.

opencc-by-4.0Jun 2023View details →

opencc-zeroJun 2023View details →

Dryland soil restoration meta-analysis data

This dataset was used to conduct a meta-analysis on soil restoration in global drylands. It includes data collected from published literature on experiments of soil-based restoration in dryland environments. Predictor variables included in this dataset are site aridity and percent soil sand, type of restoration treatment used, whether seeding or revegetating was done, and time since restoration. Response variables include the effect of soil restoration on aggregate stability, bulk density, volumetric water content, soil organic carbon, soil nitrogen, mycorrhizal colonization, and basal respiration. The calculated effect size on each of these variables is represented as the log response ratio.

opencc-zeroJul 2023View details →

Data from: Washington, Oregon, and California eelgrass restoration database

Seagrass habitats, which provide essential ecosystem functions such as water quality improvement, biodiversity support, ocean acidification amelioration, and sediment carbon storage, are declining worldwide. Eelgrass (Zostera marina) habitats along the contiguous U.S. west coast are threatened by conflicting human uses and global change, resulting in significant protections and efforts to restore areas where habitat is extant or degraded. Despite a history of eelgrass restoration in this region spanning nearly 60 years, very little work has been published on the subject. Here, we conduct a review of all available literature on eelgrass restoration projects conducted in California, Oregon, and Washington. Of the 82 restoration projects included in this analysis, which occurred from 1989 to 2020, only 6 were published in peer-reviewed journals. Thus, despite the precedent for conducting restoration, a lack of data availability makes assessing regional success, drivers of failure, and best practices extremely difficult. From this synthesis, we find that the majority of restoration projects (73%) have occurred for mitigation (compliance) purposes, contributing to the lack of peer-reviewed literature on the subject. We find that while eelgrass mitigation policies serve to maintain eelgrass structure and regional acreages, they do not facilitate assessments of habitat function or incentivize advancements in regional best practices. We also find that when we could evaluate project outcomes, 32.3 to 59.6% of restoration plots were unsuccessful by the end of the project, but this percentage is highly dependent on how success is defined. According to restoration practitioners, failure was likely to result from environmental factors such as light, nutrients, or macroalgal blooms, but was occasionally due to logistical factors such as restoration method or approach. From this work, we recommend a standardized, evidence-based approach to restoration, improved data sharing practices, and careful consideration of existing eelgrass mitigation practices. As marine habitat restoration enters a new global stage, backed by public and private investment, burgeoning carbon markets, and global biodiversity initiatives, it is essential to learn from past work to understand and improve seagrass conservation and restoration success.

opencc-zeroJul 2023View details →

Data for: A unique C-terminal domain contributes to the molecular function of restorer-of-fertility proteins in plant mitochondria

Restorer-of-fertility (Rf) genes have practical applications in hybrid seed production as a means to control self-pollination. They encode pentatricopeptide repeat (PPR) proteins that are targeted to mitochondria where they specifically bind to transcripts that induce cytoplasmic male sterility and repress their expression. We have identified a unique domain, RfCTD (Restorer-of-fertility C-terminal domain), which discriminates Restorer-of-fertility-like (RFL) proteins from hundreds of PPR proteins encoded in plant genomes. Using the sequence of this domain from hundreds of plant species, we have constructed a sequence profile that can quickly and accurately identify RfCTD sequences in plant genomes or transcriptomes. This data set contains PPR genes identified in 213 plant genomes (as summarised in accompanying table).

PI3K block restores age-dependent neurovascular coupling defects associated with cerebral small vessel disease

Neurovascular coupling (NVC), a vital physiological process that rapidly and precisely directs localized blood flow to the most active regions of the brain, is accomplished in part by the vast network of cerebral capillaries acting as a sensory web capable of detecting increases in neuronal activity and orchestrating the dilation of upstream parenchymal arterioles. Here, we report a Col4a1 mutant mouse model of cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD) with age-dependent defects in capillary-to-arteriole dilation, functional hyperemia in the brain, and memory. The fundamental defect in aged mutant animals was the depletion of the minor membrane phospholipid phosphatidylinositol 4,5 bisphosphate (PIP2) in brain capillary endothelial cells, leading to the loss of inwardly rectifier K+ (Kir2.1) channel activity. Blocking phosphatidylinositol-3-kinase (PI3K), an enzyme that diminishes the bioavailability of PIP2 by converting it to phosphatidylinositol (3,4,5)-trisphosphate (PIP3), restored Kir2.1 channel activity, capillary-to-arteriole dilation, and functional hyperemia. In longitudinal studies, chronic PI3K inhibition also improved the memory function of aged Col4a1 mutant mice. Our data suggest that PI3K inhibition is a viable therapeutic strategy for treating defective NVC and cognitive impairment associated with cSVD.

Woodland expansion in the presence of deer: 30 years of evidence from the Cairngorms Connect landscape restoration partnership

<ol> <li>Restoring native woodlands to areas where they have been lost is a key element for tackling the nature and climate crises. Natural regeneration offers the potential to achieve this cheaply and at scale, but browsing ungulates like deer can inhibit this or alter the pattern of regeneration. This issue is particularly pronounced in the Scottish Highlands, a heavily deforested region with high deer numbers.</li> <li>We describe the work of the 600 km2 landscape restoration partnership, Cairngorms Connect, in speeding up natural woodland expansion. We use 30 years of regeneration monitoring to show a consistent, large-scale expansion of native woodland, largely through natural regeneration alongside deer culling, without the use of fences. This was achieved across the partnership, despite differing management histories and land-managing organisations (comprising two statutory agencies, one private landowner and one non-governmental organisation).</li> <li>During peak periods of woodland expansion, the area of new woodland (i.e. exceeding 100 trees per hectare) increased by 1.2%, 1.7%, 2.7% and 6.0% annually in the four landholdings' regeneration zones, equating to a total of approximately 164 ha annually of new woodland.</li> <li>Natural regeneration is however patchy and hard to predict. Higher levels of management intervention may be needed to increase species that are rarer, more palatable or further from seed sources; we recommend long-term field trials to inform this, such as those underway in Cairngorms Connect. Further research should develop techniques for remote-sensing of woodland expansion, verified against field data, combined with development of process-based models to enable us to predict the outcomes of different management scenarios.</li> <li> Synthesis and applications: We show that collaborative deer management across multiple adjoining landholdings can achieve rapid landscape-scale native woodland expansion with minimal need for planting or fencing. Our results show the power of monitoring regeneration directly, to inform deer management for an area. We demonstrate that by uniting over a shared vision, organisations with differing management approaches and histories can build understanding alongside landscape-scale ecological restoration.</li> </ol>

opencc-by-4.0Aug 2023View details →

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Data for the paper Prey consumption does not restore hydration state but mitigates the energetic costs of water deprivation in an insectivorous lizard

Morphological and physiological data for the paper untitled "Prey consumption does not restore hydration state but mitigates the energetic costs of water deprivation in an insectivorous lizard" published in Journal of Experimental Biology in 2023 Additionnal data on statistical analysis and model summary

Data from: Distribution, drivers, and restoration priorities of plant invasions in India

Biological invasions threaten biodiversity and human wellbeing, with developing tropical countries being more vulnerable. Despite the urgency to reduce impacts of invasions, management interventions are constrained by unavailability of timely information on invasive species occurrence, potential drivers, and restoration priorities. Generating this information at biogeographic scales can be costly, unless integrated with multi-objective biodiversity monitoring. Invasive plant monitoring is integrated with India's national-scale tiger population assessment, wherein natural areas are sampled at 25 km2 scale to inventory plants. In 2018, a total of 158,979 plots were sampled covering ~358,550 km2. We used 206,393 locations of high concern invasive plants to model their distribution using socio-ecological covariates and identify potential drivers of invasions. Considering the invasion magnitude and financial constraints in management, we further identified priority restorations sites at national-scale to maximize biodiversity outcomes. High-concern invasive plants were recorded from ~254,880 km2 (72% sampled area) and modelled to invade in total ~750,905 km2 (66%) Indian natural systems. While open and deciduous ecosystems were the highest invaded by woody plants, areas with extreme climate and less anthropic pressure were least invaded. Since managing invasions across their range seemed futile due to costly (~13.5 billion USD for one-time management) and ineffective strategies, restoration priority was assigned to least invaded areas (11% protected areas, 23% multi-use) to maximize biodiversity returns. Synthesis and applications: India implemented national-scale invasive plant monitoring by integrating it with the umbrella project on tiger assessment. Embarking on this big data, we show that two-thirds of India's natural areas are under multiple plant invasions, owing to the legacy of anthropogenic modifications. Our study offers a restoration priority model, empowering policymakers to devise adaptive strategies for restoring invaded biomes and maximizing biodiversity returns.

Late gene therapy limits the restoration of retinal function in a mouse model of retinitis pigmentosa

Retinitis pigmentosa is an inherited photoreceptor degeneration that begins with rod loss followed by cone loss. This cell loss greatly diminishes vision, with most patients becoming legally blind. Gene therapies are being developed, but it is unknown how retinal function depends on the time of intervention. To uncover this dependence, we utilize a mouse model of retinitis pigmentosa capable of artificial genetic rescue. This model enables a benchmark of best-case gene therapy by removing variables that complicate the ability to answer this vital question. Complete genetic rescue was performed at 25%, 50%, and 70% rod loss (early, mid, and late, respectively). Here we show early- and mid-treatment restores retinal function to near wild-type levels, specifically the sensitivity and signal fidelity of retinal ganglion cells, the output neurons of the retina. However, some anatomical defects persist. Late treatment retinas exhibit continued, albeit slowed, loss of sensitivity and signal fidelity among retinal ganglion cells, as well as persistent gliosis. We conclude that gene replacement therapies delivered after 50% rod loss are unlikely to restore visual function to normal. This is critical information for administering gene therapies to rescue vision.

opencc-zeroSep 2023View details →

Data from: Blue carbon benefits from global saltmarsh restoration

Coastal saltmarshes are found globally, yet are 25–50% reduced compared to their historical cover. Restoration is incentivised by the promise that marshes are efficient storers of 'blue' carbon, although the claim lacks substantiation across global contexts. We synthesised data from 431 studies to quantify the benefits of saltmarsh restoration to carbon accumulation and greenhouse gas uptake. The results showed global marshes store approximately 1.41–2.44 Pg carbon. Restored marshes had very low greenhouse gas (GHG) fluxes and rapid carbon accumulation, resulting in a mean net accumulation rate of 64.70 t CO2e ha-1 y-1. Using this estimate and potential restoration rates, we find saltmarsh regeneration could result in 12.93–207.03 Mt CO2e accumulation per year, offsetting the equivalent of up to 0.51% global-energy-related CO2 emissions – a substantial amount, considering marshes represent <1% of Earth's surface. Carbon accumulation rates and GHG fluxes varied contextually with temperature, rainfall and dominant vegetation, with the eastern costs of the USA and Australia being particular hotspots for carbon storage. Whilst the study reveals paucity of data for some variables and continents, suggesting a need for further research, the potential for saltmarsh restoration to offset carbon emissions is clear. The ability to facilitate natural carbon accumulation by saltmarshes now rests principally on the action of the management-policy community and on financial opportunities for supporting restoration.

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Data from: Herbivory limits success of vegetation restoration globally

Herbivory limits success of vegetation restoration globally. Restoring vegetation in degraded ecosystems is an increasingly common practice for promoting biodiversity and ecological function, but successful implementation is hampered by an incomplete understanding of the processes limiting restoration success. By assembling terrestrial and aquatic studies globally (2594 experimental tests from 610 articles), we reveal substantial herbivore control of vegetation under restoration. Herbivores at restoration sites reduced vegetation abundance more strongly (by 89%, on average) than at relatively undegraded sites, and suppressed, rather than fostered, plant diversity. These effects were particularly pronounced in regions with higher temperatures and lower precipitation. Temporally excluding targeted herbivores or introducing their predators improved restoration by magnitudes similar to or greater than managing plant competition or facilitation. Thus, managing herbivory is a promising strategy for enhancing vegetation restoration efforts. This ZIP file contains the following datasets and code for the above paper: 1) Xu_ConsumerEffects.xlsx This file contains the Global Consumer Effects dataset (and several subsets) 2) Xu_PlantInteractions.xlsx This file contains the Global Plant Interactions and Restoration dataset 3) Code_Xu_Restoration_Ms.R This file contains examples of main R code used.  See the Supplementary Materials of the paper for methods used to collect and analyze these data.

opencc-by-4.0Sep 2023View details →

opencc-zeroDec 2022View details →

Creating new littoral zones in a shallow lake to forward-restore an aquatic food web

Freshwater fish communities typically thrive in heterogenous ecosystems that offer various abiotic conditions. However, human impact increasingly leads to loss of this natural heterogeneity and its associated rich fish communities. To reverse this trend, we need guidelines on how to effectively restore or recreate habitats for multiple fish species. Lake Markermeer in the Netherlands is a human-created 70,000-ha lake with a uniform 4 m-water depth, steep shorelines, high wind-induced turbidity, and a declining fish community. In 2016, a forward-looking restoration project newly created a 1000-ha five-island archipelago in this degrading lake, which offered new sheltered shallow waters and deep sand excavations to the fish community. In 2020, we assessed how omnivorous and piscivorous fish species used these new habitats by tracking 78 adult fish of five key species across local and lake scales. We monitored spring arrival of adult fish and assessed local macro-invertebrate and young-of-the-year fish densities. Adult omnivorous Cyprinidae and piscivorous Percidae arrived at the archipelago in early spring, corresponding with expected spawning movements. During the productive summer season, 12 species of young-of-the-year fish appeared along the sheltered shorelines, with particularly high densities of common roach (Rutilus rutilus) and European perch (Perca fluviatilis). This suggests the sheltered, shallow, vegetated waters formed new suitable spawning and recruitment habitat for the fish community. Despite the highest food densities for adult fish in the shallowest habitats (< 2-m), adult fish preferred minimally 2-m deep water. After spawning, most Cyprinidae left the archipelago and moved long distances through the lake system, while most Percidae remained resident. This may be related to (1) high densities of young-of-the-year fish as food for piscivores, (2) medium food densities for omnivores compared to elsewhere in the lake-system, or (3) the attractiveness of 30-m deep sand excavations that were newly created and frequently used by one-third of all tracked fish. New littoral zones and a deep sand excavation constructed in a uniform shallow lake that lacked these habitat types attracted omnivorous and piscivorous fish species within four years. Both feeding guilds used the littoral zones for reproduction and nursery, and notably piscivorous fish became residents year-round.

opencc-zeroSep 2023View details →

Forest restoration treatments indirectly diversify pollination networks via floral- and temperature-mediated effects

In North American conifer forests a variety of federally initiated thinning programs are implemented to restore pre-European settlement forest structures, but these changes may impact ecosystem function via impacts on sensitive biotic communities. Across the wildland-urban interface of the Front Range region of Colorado, agencies associated with the 'Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program' (CFLRP) have implemented thinning treatments across thousands of hectares of ponderosa pine forest; here we leverage these treatments as an experimental framework to examine thinning effects on a pollinator community. We measured variation in forest structure and sampled bee community assemblages using multiple methods (trapping and netting) to compare bee biodiversity and patterns of floral visitation by bees (bee-flower networks) between mechanically thinned stands that were 3–10 years post-treatment and non-thinned stands. Three key findings emerged: (1) Native bee abundance, richness, and diversity were 120, 53, and 37% greater, respectively, in thinned stands. Nestedness, richness, and abundance of bee-flower interactions were all substantially higher in thinned stands, and there was increased functional redundancy in bee assemblages after thinning. (2) Structural equation modelling indicated that variation in temperature and floral abundance were mediated by canopy openness and were correlated with bee richness and abundance, thereby indirectly driving variation in bee-flower interactions. (3) Four floral species (Penstemon virens, Cerastium arvense, Erysimum capitatum, and Geranium caespitosum) were identified as key connectors in bee-flower interaction networks, though these were not necessarily the most abundant flowering plants. Our analyses indicate that native bee α-diversity and bee-flower interactions positively responded to thinning treatments, and these effects were indirectly driven by canopy removal. We conclude that CFLRP treatments have conservation value for native bee communities. Further monitoring is warranted to evaluate the longevity of these effects.