We studied the impacts of re-vegetation on soil moisture dynamics and evapotranspiration (ET) of five land cover types in the Loess Plateau in northern China. Soil moisture and temperature variations under grass (Andropogon), subshrub (Artemisia scoparia), shrub (Spiraea pubescens), plantation forest (Robinia pseudoacacia), and crop (Zea mays) vegetation were continuously monitored during the g...

We examined the spatial distribution, occurrence, and socioecological predictors of woody invasive plants (WIP) in two subtropical, coastal urban ecosystems: San Juan, Puerto Rico and Miami-Dade, United States. These two cities have similar climates and ecosystems typical of subtropical regions but differ in socioeconomics, topography, and urbanization processes. Using permanent plot data, avai...

Hawaiian tropical dry forests are a unique and highly endangered ecosystem. Remaining fragments are heavily impacted by invasive plant species, particularly the perennial bunchgrass Pennisetum setaceum (Forssk.) Chiov. (fountain grass). Little is known about the impact of invasive species on carbon cycling in terrestrial ecosystems. Biomass estimates are a critical first step in understanding t...

This research attempt to establish a grass cover change model based on cellular automata. It took the relationship between elevation, slope, aspect, settlement, road, water system and grass cover change as the foundation of the model, the dynamic progress of grass cover change was expressed by using cellular automata, the grass cover change model based on the basic geographical control conditio...

Many arid grassland communities are changing from grass dominance to shrub dominance, but the mechanisms involved in this conversion process are not completely understood. Aeolian processes likely contribute to this conversion from grassland to shrubland. The purpose of this research is to provide information regarding how vegetation changes occur in an arid grassland as a result of aeolian sed...

In this study, hydro-meteorological data collected from 1964 to 1976 on an approximately 5,000 ha predominantly forested coastal watershed (Turkey Creek) at the Francis Marion National Forest near Charleston, SC were analyzed to estimate annual evapotranspiration (ET) using four different empirical methods. The first one, reported by Zhang et al. (2001), that takes into account annual precipita...

This paper uses a multi-proxy approach involving pollen, plant macrofossils, speleothem isotopes, and alluvial history of streams to reconstruct the history of prairie expansion and contraction along the prairie-forest border of southeastern Minnesota, USA. Early Holocene forests were replaced by prairie along this border, but eastward expansion of prairie stalled for 2000 yr when the prairie-f...

Corridors that connect otherwise isolated habitats have often been proposed as a management strategy to mitigate negative effects of habitat fragmentation. Non-crop corridors may have the potential to enhance the connectivity for arthropod predators in cropland landscapes, especially for species that require multiple habitats, such as cavity-nesting wasps which use wooded habitat for nesting an...

Abstract Decadal changes in land use/land cover for Balachaur watershed in Nawanshahar district, Punjab, India were studied using black and white aerial photographs for March 1984 on approximately 1:20,000 scale and multidate geocoded false colour composites (FCC) of IRS-1D LISS-III on 1:50,000 scale for March 2002, September 2002, and May 2003 and interpreted visually to prepare land use/land...