Walory przyrodnicze doliny Wdy w okolicach Świecia

River valleys hold great natural value. They constitute important ecological corridors, through which various species of plants and animals can migrate. The river along with the adjoining wet meadows and forests are places of great biodiversity. River valleys in our country, especially the Wda valley, have not been thus far thoroughly studied. This paper aims to discusses the flora of the part of the Wda valley between the villages of Kozłowo and Wyrwa. At this short distance (2.3 km) up to 496 species of vascular plants were found, of which 12 are under legal protection and another 40 are threatened and regionally endangered.Doliny rzeczne mają olbrzymie znaczenie przyrodnicze. Stanowią ważne korytarze ekologiczne, którymi mogą migrować różne gatunki roślin i zwierząt. Rzeka oraz przylegające do niej obszary wilgotnych łąk i lasów to miejsca występowania największej różnorodności biologicznej. Doliny rzeczne w naszym kraju, a szczególnie dolina Wdy, należą do siedlisk stosunkowo słabo zbadanych, dlatego przedmiotem prezentowanej pracy jest flora fragmentu doliny Wdy pomiędzy miejscowościami Wyrwa i Kozłowo. Na tym krótkim odcinku (2,3 km) stwierdzono aż 496 gatunków roślin naczyniowych, w tym 12 objętych ochroną prawną oraz 40 zagrożonych i ginących regionalnie

The impact of salvage logging on herb layer species composition and plant community recovery in Białowieża Forest

Białowieża Forest is one of the closest to pristine forest ecosystems in temperate vegetation zone in European Lowland, which is still being transformed by forest management. We investigated the effects of salvage logging of spruce stands killed by bark beetle on the recovery process and the biodiversity of the herb layer in the early stages of vegetation development after felling, on the habitat of mixed deciduous, oak-lime-hornbeam forest (Tilio-Carpinetum). We tested: (i) to what extent salvage logging modifies the plant species richness and diversity compared to sites left intact; (ii) whether clear-felling leads to an increase in diversity of vascular plants; and (iii) which ecological groups of plants benefit, and which are hindered by disturbance, depending on age and size of the clear-felled site. Salvage harvesting executed between 2012 and 2016 led to an increase in overall plant diversity. However, the winners were the species of open habitats, promoted by soil disturbance, whereas the number and cover of ancient forest indicator species decreased in comparison to unlogged forests. Both trends were significantly related to the increasing size of clear-felled sites, and developed right after logging. A comparison of the species composition of the disturbed (logged and unlogged) sites with undisturbed forest with stands unaffected by infestation, treated as control plots revealed the great potential of the affected sites for spontaneous recovery towards the oak-lime-hornbeam forest community, despite 50–90 years of spruce-dominated stand cover. We conclude that continuous deterioration of the forest habitats via clearcutting of stands affected by insect outbreak, followed by tree planting, substantially reduces the chances of successful, natural regeneration towards deciduous, structurally complex and diverse forests

Diversity, distribution patterns and indicatory potential of echinoderm communities of the tropical East Atlantic (Gulf of Guinea): Influence of multiple natural and anthropogenic factors along a 25–1000 m depth gradient

All earlier studies of the West African echinoderm fauna have focused on taxonomy, and general knowledge about benthic community responses to various human related threats are poorly diagnosed and not monitored along the whole African coast. Our analysis of diversity and distribution patterns of Ghanaian echinoderms yielded 36 species. Material was collected at nine transects distributed along the coast of Ghana (25–1000 m depth range, total of over 270 samples). Gradual decreases in species richness, diversity, evenness and abundance were observed along the depth gradient, with the most diverse fauna being recorded on the shelf (25–50 m). The most abundant species were Ophiactis luetkeni and Ophiothrix congensis, although both had very patchy distributions. Cluster analysis separated shelf communities (25–100 m) from slope communities (500–1000 m), although on a low level of similarity. Our analysis allowed to select most vulnerable benthic habitats that should be amongst priorities of the future monitoring. Local influence of arsenic was observed at some shelf sites, while slope fauna was affected by elevated levels of hydrocarbons and barium. Changes in salinity and fluorescence also influenced echinoderm assemblages. The most general trend showed patchily distributed, diverse shallow water fauna being influenced by increased microhabitat diversity and food availability, while depauperate slope fauna was affected by local disturbances associated with oil extraction. Tropical echinoderm communities have a great potential as indicators of even minor and local pollution, although high patchiness and low abundance creates difficulties in the multivariate analysis. High sampling effort and high number of replicates allowed to minimise those problems and demonstrated small scale microhabitat diversity.publishedVersio

Environmental drivers and spatial scaling of species abundance distributions in Palaearctic grassland vegetation

[EN] Species abundance distributions (SADs) link species richness with species abundances and are an important tool in the quantitative analysis of ecological communities. Niche-based and sample-based SAD models predict different spatial scaling properties of SAD parameters. However, empirical research on SAD scaling properties is largely missing. Here we extracted percentage cover values of all occurring vascular plants as proxies of their abundance in 1725 10-m(2) plots from the GrassPlot database, covering 47 regional data sets of 19 different grasslands and other open vegetation types of the Palaearctic biogeographic realm. For each plot, we fitted the Weibull distribution, a model that is able to effectively mimic other distributions like the log-series and lognormal, to the species-log abundance rank order distribution. We calculated the skewness and kurtosis of the empirical distributions and linked these moments, along with the shape and scale parameters of the Weibull distribution, to plot climatic and soil characteristics. The Weibull distribution provided excellent fits to grassland plant communities and identified four basic types of communities characterized by different degrees of dominance. Shape and scale parameter values of local communities on poorer soils were largely in accordance with log-series distributions. Proportions of subdominant species tended to be lower than predicted by the standard lognormal SAD. Successive accumulation of plots of the same vegetation type yielded nonlinear spatial scaling of SAD moments and Weibull parameters. This scaling was largely independent of environmental correlates and geographic plot position. Our findings caution against simple generalizations about the mechanisms that generate SADs. We argue that in grasslands, lognormal-type SADs tend to prevail within a wider range of environmental conditions, including more extreme habitats such as arid environments. In contrast, log-series distributions are mainly restricted to comparatively species-rich communities on humid and fertile soils.We thank all vegetation scientists who carefully collected the plant diversity data and contributed them to GrassPlot. The Eurasian Dry Grassland Group (EDGG) and the International Association for Vegetation Science (IAVS) supported the EDGG field workshops, which generated a core part of the GrassPlot data. The Bavarian Research Alliance (via the BayIntAn scheme) and the Bayreuth Center of Ecology and Environmental Research (BayCEER) funded the initial GrassPlot workshop during which the database was established (grants to Jurgen Dengler). Werner Ulrich acknowledges support from the Polish National Science Centre (Grant 2017/27/B/NZ8/00316). Idoia Biurrun and Juan Antonio Campos were partly supported by the Basque Government (IT936-16). Goffredo Filibeck was partly supported by the MIUR initiative "Department of Excellence" (Law 232/2016) granted to DAFNE. Peter Torok was supported by the NKFIH K 119225 and K 137573 projects and the HAS Momentum Program during the manuscript preparation. Franz Essl appreciates funding by the Austrian Science Foundation FWF (Grant I 3757-B29)

Observer and relocation errors matter in resurveys of historical vegetation plots

Aim: Revisits of non-permanent, relocatable plots first surveyed several decades ago offer a direct way to observe vegetation change and form a unique and increasingly used source of information for global change research. Despite the important insights that can be obtained from resurveying these quasi-permanent vegetation plots, their use is prone to both observer and relocation errors. Studying the combined effects of both error types is important since they will play out together in practice and it is yet unknown to what extent observed vegetation changes are influenced by these errors. Methods: We designed a study that mimicked all steps in a resurvey study and that allowed determination of the magnitude of observer errors only vs the joint observer and relocation errors. Communities of vascular plants growing in the understorey of temperate forests were selected as study system. Ten regions in Europe were covered to explore generality across contexts and 50 observers were involved, which deliberately differed in their experience in making vegetation records. Results: The mean geographic distance between plots in the observer+relocation error data set was 24m. The mean relative difference in species richness in the observer error and the observer+relocation data set was 15% and 21%, respectively. The mean pseudo-turnover between the five records at a quasi-permanent plot location was on average 0.21 and 0.35 for the observer error and observer+relocation error data sets, respectively. More detailed analyses of the compositional variation showed that the nestedness and turnover components were of equal importance in the observer data set, whereas turnover was much more important than nestedness in the observer+relocation data set. Interestingly, the differences between the observer and the observer+relocation data sets largely disappeared when looking at temporal change: both the changes in species richness and species composition over time were very similar in these data sets. Conclusions: Our results demonstrate that observer and relocation errors are non-negligible when resurveying quasi-permanent plots. A careful interpretation of the results of resurvey studies is warranted, especially when changes are assessed based on a low number of plots. We conclude by listing measures that should be taken to maximally increase the precision and the strength of the inferences drawn from vegetation resurveys

Disentangling effects of disturbance severity and frequency: does bioindication really work?

Ecological disturbances are recognized as a crucial factor influencing the attributes of ecological communities. Depending on the specific adaptation or life cycle, plant species show different responses to disturbances of different magnitudes. Herben et al. (2016) proposed disturbance indicator values (DIVs) that describe the niche of each Central-European plant species along gradients of disturbance frequency and severity. Here we ask if the DIVs can be used in community ecology for bioindication of disturbance regime? We used a dataset of riparian forests sampled within mountain catchments (the Sudetes, SW Poland). As the regime of disturbance is driven by changes in floods from the spring towards the mouth, we calculated the position of every plot along longitudinal (upstream-downstream) gradient and used it as a proxy for the disturbance severity and frequency. We then calculated the community-weighted means (CWMs) for each of the six indices for each plot and analyzed whether these indices reflected the position of the plots along the rivers. We expected an increase in the severity indices and a decrease in the frequency indices downstream along the rivers. Moreover, we analyzed relationships between disturbance indices and species optima along longitudinal gradient. Surprisingly, means for all analyzed indices increased along the rivers. Severity indices showed the strongest association with the longitudinal gradient. The disturbance severity index for herbs was the only index that differed significantly among species with different responses along longitudinal gradient. On these results, we identified a strong correlation between the severity and frequency indices as the main problem. We conclude that the DIVs have considerable applicative potential; however, the determination of ecological niches separately for disturbance severity and frequency is difficult because different components interact to shape the realized niche of each species. All analyzed indices encompass different attributes of the disturbance regime including both severity and frequency.The extended dataset is stored in the Forest Database of Southern Poland (Pielech et al., 2018). It includes also spring forest and a broad array of environmental variables. Funding provided by: Ministerstwo Nauki i Szkolnictwa WyższegoCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100004569Award Number: N N304 074736The riparian forests were surveyed along mountain rivers in the Polish part of the Sudetes, SW Poland. The dataset used in this study was collected between 2006 and 2009 following the methods of the Central-European phytosociology (Dzwonko, 2007; Kent, 2012). All plots were located close to the river bank; plots were rectangular (7.5 × 20 m) and oriented with the long dimension parallel to the upstream-downstream gradient of the river. The cover of vascular plants was estimated for each of three layers (trees, shrubs and herbs) using the Domin-Krajina scale with an ordinal transformation proposed by van der Maarel (1979). Plots were also located with a GPS receiver and recorded in a mobile GIS database. The precise localization and digital river network (Map of Hydrographic Division of Poland, MPHP) enabled the calculation of the distance from the river source for all the sampled plots. More details regarding study area and vegetation sampling are available in the previous study (Pielech et al., 2015). The full dataset is stored in the Forest Database of Southern Poland (Pielech et al., 2018). Values of DIVs are taken from Herben et al. (2016)

Is salvage logging a proper tool for restoration of forest ecosystems affected by bark beetle outbreak?

Is salvage logging on deciduous forest habitats essential in restoration of forest ecosystems affected by bark beetle outbreak? Biotic and abiotic disturbances are part of the life cycle of natural forests. They increase the structural and biotic diversity of forests ecosystems. Norway-spruce dominated stands of Central Europe are often affected by outbreaks of Ips typographus, which initiate "stand replacement" pathways of forest regeneration (sensu Veblen 1992). Such processes are difficult to accept from the point of view of forestry. Thus, in forest stands disturbed by the insect outbreaks, salvage logging and tree replanting are usually implemented, while natural processes leading to forest regeneration play the minor role. We studied two different aspects of forest ecosystem recovery in salvage logged and in unmanaged (not logged) spruce-dominated forests affected by spruce bark beetle: (1) tree regeneration dynamics in the lower mountain zone of the Beskidy Mts. (Silesian Beskids, S Poland), and (2) changes in herb layer composition in the lowlands, in the Białowieża Forest (N-E Poland). Both, in mountains and lowlands, the ratio of spruce in the studied stands was artificially high (50-90% and 20-80%, respectively) due to former rejuvenation planting on sites of broadleaved forests. Otherwise, deciduous trees would naturally dominate in these forest habitats: beech in the mountains and oak, lime and hornbeam in the lowlands. In the mountainous zone we investigated the sites where all dead trees were removed with no successive tree replanting (the reference stands where no trees were logged were not available). Natural tree regeneration process was very dynamic and led to re-establishment of beech-dominated stands. In the lowlands the total species richness of the herb layer was significantly higher in sites with removed dead trees and trees replanted. However, an increase was mainly due to appearance of species characteristic of non-forest, open habitats. Such trends were not observed in sites with untreated sites with standing dead spruce. In contrast, compared to salvage-logged sites, ancient woodland species, typical to mixed deciduous forest maintained higher abundance in unmanaged stands, where salvage logging did not take place. Both forest types studied revealed great potential for natural reestablishment of species composition typical to deciduous forests. Thus, from the conservation point of view post-disturbance salvage logging is needed neither for recovery of beech in the mountain deciduous forests nor for recovery of herb layer of mixed-deciduous forests in the lowlands. Furthermore, in the case of lowland forests investigated such treatements inhibit the spontaneous recovery of herb layer species composition typical to broadleaved forests. Veblen T.T. 1992. Regeneration dynamics,in: Plant succession: theory and prediction (eds. D.C. Glenn-Lewin, R.K. Peet, T.T. Veblen). Chapman and Hall, London, 152-187.peerReviewe

Spatial niche segregation between bird species in the Białowieża primeval forest (NE Poland)

Drivers of bird niche separation in temperate primeval forests have not yet been determined, due to the low number of intact forest sites. Here, we analyzed the general patterns of niche usage on trees by birds’ assemblages. We tested how tree species affect the sharing of space in an assemblage of birds and their level of specialization. We conducted our study in the Białowieża primeval forest (NE Poland). During two breeding seasons, we observed bird positions on trees, divided into three vertical and six horizontal zones in 768 observation points. Based on the interaction networks framework we calculated the Kullback-Leibler distance d′ as a metric of species specialization and the resource range RR index, which estimates the species’ specificity based on the fraction of space utilized with a non-zero performance. The d′ index was the highest in the lower understory for all parts of the tree on the basis of the position from the trunk. The RR index was the highest in the lower understory for all parts based on the position from the trunk. Regarding the tree species, the lowest d′ index was observed in all tree species together, and hornbeam, whereas the highest in oak. At the tree species level, the RR index was the lowest for hornbeam. We show tree species importance in forest space sharing in the case of bird assemblages. Hornbeam, alder, and spruce are universal species that were used by birds almost entirely. In contrast, oak, lime, and maple were only partially used. Tree species with less complex structures could shape bird assemblages, as they could offer birds much fewer niches to realize. Therefore, we showed that high specialization and niche separation are drivers of high bird diversity. Consequently maintaining a diverse stand structure is crucial for biodiversity conservation

Citizen science helps predictions of climate change impact on flowering phenology: A study on Anemone nemorosa

Rapidly increasing resources of citizen science databases (CS) collecting information on species occurrence are increasingly useful as a data source for global biodiversity research. The photos attached to records allow to verify the species identification and identify its phenological phase. We assessed CS data's usefulness in large-scale phenological research on temperate forest understory species, using a common and widely distributed in Europe: Anemone nemorosa. We analyzed 9804 photos from CS databases. We found 177 15’ grid cells with ≥10 observations of flowering plants for bootstrap estimation of flowering onset and offset. We predicted flowering dates for the present and future climate according to Shared Socioeconomic Pathways averaged over four global circulation models for 2040–60 and 2060–80 across A. nemorosa natural range. The estimated magnitude of change in the flowering phenology for both future periods is comparable. The estimated flowering onset median was 24–41 days earlier while flowering offset median was 19–34 days earlier than predicted for the current climate. We estimated a flowering length median of up to 7 days longer than for current climatic conditions. The predicted changes in the phenology of flowering will not significantly change the duration of flowering but will accelerate onset of this phenophase by about one month. Our study showed that CS might provide a valuable dataset that allows for developing reliable models of plant phenology. It was possible due to a large sample size, resulting from species characteristics: flowering when wider audience is interested in searching spring indicators, easy identification and abundant occurrence. We demonstrated that using dataset of such spatiotemporal extent can cautiously be used for development of future predictions. Such approach allows for evaluating flowering phenology in the understory and to improve understanding the consequences of climate change for biodiversity and functioning of temperate ecosystems