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Rare plant species do not occupy water‐remote refuges in arid environments subject to livestock grazing
- Source :
- Ecological Applications. 29
- Publication Year :
- 2019
- Publisher :
- Wiley, 2019.
-
Abstract
- In many of the world's arid regions there has been a dramatic increase in grazing pressure with herds of livestock sustained by the provision of artificial water points. In these systems it has been suggested that grazing-sensitive plant species will have contracted to refuges distant from water points where grazing impacts are low. This association was tested using a large data set of presence/absence records for rare plant species throughout the northeastern Australian arid zone. The presence records of only one of 45 species were statistically associated with lower grazing activity, as a function of distance-to-water, than the absence records. The field observation that this species is rarely grazed suggests it is not susceptible to grazing pressure. In general, the study supports assertions that populations of short-lived plants in drylands are resilient in the face of exaggerated livestock grazing because herbivores are not in sufficient densities to have an impact during the sporadic periods of high rainfall when plants can complete their life cycles. However, long-lived palatable species may be extinction-prone in grazed landscapes over long time frames if recruitment is curtailed by grazing.
- Subjects :
- 0106 biological sciences
Herbivore
Livestock
Ecology
business.industry
animal diseases
010604 marine biology & hydrobiology
Livestock grazing
Australia
Water
Plants
010603 evolutionary biology
01 natural sciences
Arid
Grazing pressure
Geography
parasitic diseases
Grazing
Plant species
Animals
Herbivory
business
Arid zone
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 19395582 and 10510761
- Volume :
- 29
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Ecological Applications
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....9289241bbf941c7fac02bc2ec1bf4cf0