Limited directional change in mountaintop plant communities over 19 years in western North America

IF 2.7 3区 环境科学与生态学 Q2 ECOLOGY
Ecosphere Pub Date : 2025-03-27 DOI:10.1002/ecs2.70197
Kaleb A. Goff, Meagan F. Oldfather, Jan Nachlinger, Brian V. Smithers, Michael J. Koontz, Catie Bishop, Jim Bishop, Mary T. Burke, Seema N. Sheth
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Abstract

Plant communities on mountain summits are commonly long-lived, cold-adapted perennials with low dispersal ability. These characteristics in tandem with limited area to track suitable conditions make these mountain communities potentially highly vulnerable to climate change, and indicators of climate change impacts. We investigated temporal changes in plant communities on 29 arid mountain summits across eight study regions in California and Nevada, USA, over 19 years. We analyzed community dynamics in terms of species richness, turnover, gain and loss of functional groups, and relative abundance of functional groups. First, across all summits and regions, we found no change in species richness over time. Second, there was relatively high species turnover (21.7%) between the five-year survey intervals, but turnover was not significantly different from random expectation. Within functional groups, forbs had the greatest proportion of gains and cushions had the greatest proportion of losses. Third, qualitative abundance categories presented a small but consistent signal of decrease in the relative abundance of cushions, graminoids, and shrubs/trees over the study period. Across a broad geographic scale and nearly two decades, community patterns were widely similar, suggesting that climate change has not impacted local colonization or extirpation of mountaintop species in this arid region. These findings support observed differences in response to climate change between temperature-limited and water-limited regions globally, and highlight the lagged and variable nature of high-elevation systems. Our findings fill a major data gap on alpine plant community responses to climate change in the western United States and bolster the importance of long-term ecological monitoring with rapid climate change.

Abstract Image

北美西部19年来山顶植物群落有限的方向性变化
山顶上的植物群落通常是长寿命的,适应寒冷的多年生植物,具有低的扩散能力。这些特征加上追踪合适条件的面积有限,使这些山区社区可能极易受到气候变化的影响,也是气候变化影响的指标。研究了19年来美国加利福尼亚州和内华达州8个研究区29座干旱山峰植物群落的时间变化。从物种丰富度、更替、功能群增减和功能群相对丰度等方面分析了群落动态。首先,在所有高峰和地区,我们发现物种丰富度没有随时间变化。(2) 5年调查周期内物种流动率较高(21.7%),但与随机预期差异不显著;在功能组中,植物的收益比例最大,而缓冲植物的损失比例最大。第三,在研究期间,软垫、禾本科植物和灌木/乔木的相对丰度呈现出较小但一致的下降信号。在近20年的时间里,在广泛的地理范围内,群落模式非常相似,这表明气候变化并没有影响这一干旱地区山顶物种的当地殖民化或灭绝。这些发现支持了已观察到的全球温度有限地区和水有限地区对气候变化的响应差异,并突出了高海拔系统的滞后和可变性质。我们的发现填补了美国西部高山植物群落对气候变化响应的主要数据空白,并加强了长期生态监测与快速气候变化的重要性。
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来源期刊
Ecosphere
Ecosphere ECOLOGY-
CiteScore
4.70
自引率
3.70%
发文量
378
审稿时长
15 weeks
期刊介绍: The scope of Ecosphere is as broad as the science of ecology itself. The journal welcomes submissions from all sub-disciplines of ecological science, as well as interdisciplinary studies relating to ecology. The journal''s goal is to provide a rapid-publication, online-only, open-access alternative to ESA''s other journals, while maintaining the rigorous standards of peer review for which ESA publications are renowned.
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