We evaluated the effects of three regeneration harvest methods on plant diversity and soil resource availability in mixedhardwood ecosystems. The study area is in the Wine Spring Creek watershed on the Nantahala National Forest of the Southern Appalachian Mountains in western North Carolina. The regeneration treatments were: an irregular, two-aged shelterwood cut (2A), with 5.0 m/ha residual ba...

1 This review brings into focus what is known about the response of the herbaceous layer of forest ecosystems to increasing nitrogen deposition. The emphasis on forests in general is important for two reasons. First, forests often occupy areas receiving high rates of atmospheric deposition of N. Second, compared with herb-dominated communities, about which much is known regarding response to ex...

Silvicultural operation need to notice the plant species diversity in forest. To this study Gomarlang district in marivan region, northern zagros forest was selected. Selected 100 ha area because have similar physiography condition (north aspect and 1650 to 1800 m s.a.l. In study area 100 micro plots of 5m by 5 m (25 m2) including the species and the numbers of this species randomize...

Growth of herbaceous plants responds sensitively and rapidly to climate variability. Yet, little is known regarding how climate warming influences the growth of herbaceous plants, particularly in semi-arid sites. This contrasts with widely reported tree growth decline and even mortality in response to severe water deficits due to climate warming around the world. Here, we use the relatively nov...

Western juniper (Juniperus occidentalis ssp. occidentalis Hook) encroachment into mountain big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata spp. vaseyana (Rydb.) Beetle) steppe has reduced livestock forage production, increased erosion risk, and degraded sagebrush-associated wildlife habitat. Western juniper has been successfully controlled with partial cutting followed by prescribed burning the next fall, ...

Ecosystem responses to key climate drivers are reflected in phenological dynamics such as the timing and degree of "green-up" that integrate responses over spatial scales from individual plants to ecosystems. This integration is clearest in ecosystems dominated by a single species or life form, such as seasonally dynamic grasslands or more temporally constant evergreen forests. Yet many ecosyst...

Herbivores are major drivers of ecosystem structure, diversity, and function. Resilient ecosystems therefore require viable herbivore populations in a sustainable balance with environmental resource availability. This balance is becoming harder to achieve, with increasingly threatened species reliant on small protected areas in increasingly harsh and unpredictable environments. Arid environment...

Silvicultural operation need to notice the plant species diversity in forest. To this study Gomarlang district in marivan region, northern zagros forest was selected. Selected 100 ha area because have similar physiography condition (north aspect and 1650 to 1800 m s.a.l. In study area 100 micro plots of 5m by 5 m (25 m2) including the species and the numbers of this species randomize...

We analyzed one of the longest-term ecological data sets to evaluate how forest overstory structure is related to herbaceous understory plant strategies in a ponderosa pine forest. Eighty-two permanent 1-m2 chart quadrats that were established as early as 1912 were remeasured in 2007. We reconstructed historical forest structure using dendrochronological techniques. Ponderosa pine basal area in...

1. We hypothesize that flowering phenology correlates with plant height growth pattern and that the pattern is associated with functional traits including maximum plant height (Hmax), RGR, stem tissue mass density (SD), hollow ratio (proportion of central hollow of stem cross-sectional area) and leafmass per area (LMA) in grassland herbaceous species. 2. We investigated plant height growth traj...