Atmosphere Ocean Science Friday Seminar

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Mechanisms and management strategies for grassland biodiversity

Speaker: Andrew Brettin, PhD Student

Location: Warren Weaver Hall 1314

Date: Friday, September 27, 2019, 3:30 p.m.

Synopsis:

Although the negative effects of nitrogen deposition on grassland biodiversity are well established, divergent findings between experiments performed at Cedar Creek Ecosystem Reserve (Anoka, US) and Rothamsted Research (Harpenden, UK) illustrate that the reversibility of nutrient-induced biodiversity loss in grasslands remains poorly understood.

While both experiments exhibited biodiversity loss over a long-term period of nitrogen loading, during the  subsequent period of nitrogen cessation, biodiversity recouped at Rothamsted but remained stagnant at Cedar Creek. Here, different potential mechanisms for the observed hysteresis in biodiversity at Cedar Creek are investigated. After showing that hysteresis may occur from the inhibitive effects of plant litter (dead plant biomass), management practices are explored. We use techniques from “flow-kick” modeling to show that periodic litter removals could be an effective strategy to restore biodiversity.