Question: Can lichen communities be used to assess shortand long-term factors affecting seral quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides) communities at the landscape scale? Location: Bear River Range, within the Rocky Mountains, in northern Utah and southern Idaho, USA. Method: Forty-seven randomly selected mid-elevation aspen stands were sampled for lichens and stand conditions. Plots were characteri...

Lichens are commonly described as a mutualistic symbiosis between fungi and "algae" (Chlorophyta or Cyanobacteria); however, they also have internal bacterial communities. Recent research suggests that lichen-associated microbes are an integral component of lichen thalli and that the classical view of this symbiotic relationship should be expanded to include bacteria. However, we still have a l...

Lichen symbioses were recently shown to include diverse bacterial communities. Although the biogeography of lichen species is fairly well known, the patterns of their bacterial associates are relatively poorly understood. Here we analyse the composition of Alphaproteobacteria in Cetraria aculeata, a common lichen species that occurs at high latitudes and various habitats. Using clone libraries ...

Introduced reindeer, Rangifer tarandus, overexploited lichen-rich plant communities on St. Matthew Island in the Bering Sea. A die-off of the reindeer followed, exacerbated by extreme weather in 1964, resulting in extirpation of the reindeer. A similar pattern of removal of lichens as major components of plant communities has occurred following introductions of reindeer to other islands at high...

Epiphytic macrolichen communities were compared among forest stand types in the Blue River watershed of western Oregon. Stand types were defined by stand structure, according to age classes of the younger tree cohort and remnant tree retention. Remnant trees were those in an older cohort that remained following a stand disturbance that initiated tree regeneration, such as a timber harvest or na...

he development of terrestrial lichen communities used as forage by woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus) in boreal and subboreal forests is strongly linked to changes in canopy structure and associated changes in canopy microclimate that occur during stand succession. Additionally, substrate type and proximity to propagule sources can have a major inluence on lichen establishment. Increasingly, ...

Bacterial communities colonize the surfaces of lichens in a biofilm-like manner. The overall structure of the bacterial communities harboured by the lichens shows similarities, in particular the dominance of not yet cultured Alphaproteobacteria. Parameters causing variation in abundance, composition and spatial organization of the lichen-associated bacterial communities are so far poorly unders...

Rapid Biodiversity Assessments (RBAs) of lichen communities, obtained by means of simplified sampling lists based on morphospecies, showed good correlations with Lichen Diversity Values (LDVs), based on the complete identification of lichen species only when performed by operators with high levels of taxonomic knowledge. Furthermore, the use of highly simplified sampling lists did not lead to s...

Johansson, P. 2006. Effects of habitat conditions and disturbance on lichen diversity: studies on lichen communities in nemoral, boreal and grassland ecosystems. Doctor’s dissertation. ISSN 1652-6880, ISBN 91-576-7055-2 This thesis includes five papers from four studies on lichen diversity in its broad sense. The overall objectives were to examine species richness, composition, distribution, an...

The loss of biological soil crusts represents a challenge for the restoration of disturbed environments, specifically in particular substrates hosting unique lichen communities. However, the recovery of lichen species affected by mining is rarely addressed in restoration projects. Here, we evaluate the translocation of Diploschistes diacapsis, a representative species of gypsum lichen communiti...