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Telling a different story: a global assessment of bryophyte invasions

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Abstract

We assess and review spatio-temporal patterns, habitat affiliations, pathways, impacts, and management experience of bryophyte invasions in extra-tropical countries and regions (n = 82) from five continents and maritime islands spanning both hemispheres. Distribution data were extracted and critically checked from a wide range of sources and supplemented with data on biology and introduction history. We identified 139 bryophytes species which we consider to be alien in at least one of our study regions (106 mosses, 28 hepatics and 5 hornworts). Numbers of average alien bryophyte species are significantly higher on islands than in continental regions of similar size, and peak on maritime islands. Cumulative numbers of first records have grown slowly until 1950 and have strongly increased since then. Accidental import as hitch-hiker (34 species) or with ornamental plants (27 species) constitute the most important introduction pathways. We found a remarkably high contribution from distant donor regions to alien bryophyte floras, especially from the complementary hemisphere. Most alien bryophytes prefer strongly modified habitats (e.g. ruderal vegetation, roadsides, lawns), and only few natural ecosystems (forests, rocks) are regularly invaded. Evidence for an ecological impact of bryophyte invasions is scarce and competitive replacement of native moss species, or vascular plant seedlings, by alien bryophytes has only been documented in a few cases. We conclude that bryophytes differ profoundly in many respects from vascular plants, and so do their invasion patterns at large scale. Our global bryophyte invasion state assessment provides the basis for future, more explicit considerations of this largely neglected taxonomic group in invasion ecology, a step we suggest to be urgently needed as studying them might provide novel insights into patterns and processes of plant invasions in general.

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Acknowledgments

Many colleagues have contributed their knowledge to the underlying data set (in brackets: region for which data have been provided): J. Beever (Chathams, New Zealand), L. Cave (Tasmania), H. Deguchi (Japan), A. Fife (Chathams, New Zealand), J.-P. Frahm (Germany, Macaronesia), D. Glenny (New Zealand), J. M. González-Mancebo (Canary Islands), M. Hill (UK), J. Klinck (Denmark), P. Lambdon (Ascension, St. Helena), J. Larrain (Chile), N. Miller (USA), F. Müller (Chile, Argentina), R. Porley (UK), R. A. Pursell (USA), R. Seppelt (Australia), M. Sabovljevic (Serbia), J. Shevock (California), J. S. Song (South Korea, Japan), A. Stebel (Poland), J.-D. Yang (Taiwan), R. Zander (USA). Their contributions have been extremely helpful. The comments of two anonymous reviewers are highly appreciated.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environment Agency Austria, Spittelauer Lände 5, 1090, Vienna, Austria

    Franz Essl, Klaus Steinbauer & Dietmar Moser

  2. Department of Conservation Biology, Vegetation and Landscape Ecology, Faculty Centre of Biodiversity, University of Vienna, Rennweg 14, 1030, Vienna, Austria

    Stefan Dullinger & Thomas Mang

  3. Vienna Institute for Nature Conservation and Analyses, Giessergasse 6/7, 1090, Vienna, Austria

    Stefan Dullinger, Thomas Mang & Dietmar Moser

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  1. Franz Essl
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  2. Klaus Steinbauer
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Correspondence to Franz Essl.

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10530_2013_422_MOESM2_ESM.csv

Appendix S2: Alien bryophyte species, their invasion status (nat = naturalized, cas = casual, crypt = cryptogenic), year of first record (FR, if known), native range (continents), pathways, habitats colonized, and substrate type colonized in the 82 regions included in this study. Supplementary material 2 (CSV 43 kb)

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Supplementary material 4 (DOC 63 kb)

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Essl, F., Steinbauer, K., Dullinger, S. et al. Telling a different story: a global assessment of bryophyte invasions. Biol Invasions 15, 1933–1946 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-013-0422-2

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