Shrub effects on seeding establishment, 2019 - 2020. ...

• Main Author: Brigham, Laurel M
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Environmental Data Initiative 2024
• Subjects: Arctic
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.6073/pasta/0e7977b6c267700482f70f13f799fe09; https://portal.edirepository.org/nis/mapbrowse?packageid=knb-lter-nwt.279.1

Plant communities in mountain ecosystems are particularly vulnerable due to amplified rates of warming (Pepin and Lundquist, 2008; Pepin et al., 2015) and declines in snowpack (Fyfe et al., 2017). As a result of these global change drivers, there is a widespread pattern of biotic shifts in the alpine (Bueno de Mesquita et al., 2018). However, it is unclear how important these biotic shifts will be in mediating the response of other species to global change. For example, the uphill movement and expansion of structure-forming species (e.g. trees, shrubs, cushion plants), can create small-scale variations in the conditions experienced by species (microclimates) through their effects on snow, wind, solar radiation, and soil properties (Holtmeier and Broll, 1992; Seastedt and Adams, 2001; Pistón et al., 2018; Chen et al., 2019). One such expanding structure-forming group of species are shrubs—the expansion and densification of shrubs is occurring in arctic and alpine zones across the globe (Myers-Smith et al., ...