Publication Date:
1998-05-13
Description:
Species diversity has declined in ecosystems worldwide as a result of habitat fragmentation, eutrophication, and land-use change. If such decline is to be halted ecological mechanisms that restore or maintain biodiversity are needed. Two long-term field experiments were performed in native grassland to assess the effects of fire, nitrogen addition, and grazing or mowing on plant species diversity. In one experiment, richness declined on burned and fertilized treatments, whereas mowing maintained diversity under these conditions. In the second experiment, loss of species diversity due to frequent burning was reversed by bison, a keystone herbivore in North American grasslands. Thus, mowing or the reestablishment of grazing in anthropogenically stressed grasslands enhanced biodiversity.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Collins -- Knapp -- riggs -- Blair -- Steinauer -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 1998 May 1;280(5364):745-7.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉S. L. Collins, Division of Environmental Biology, National Science Foundation, Arlington, VA 22230, USA. A. K. Knapp, J. M. Briggs, J. M. Blair, Division of Biology, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA. E. M. Steinauer, Department of.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9563952" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
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Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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