Yosemite nature notes.

35 no.

Yosemite nature notes.

33 no.

Yosemite nature notes.

26 no.

Yosemite nature notes.

Description based on: Vol. 24, no. 2 (Feb. 1945); title from cover.Mode of access: Internet.Issued by U.S. National Park Service and Yosemite Natural History Association (varies slightly).Vol. 1 (1922)-v. 15 (1936). 1 v

Pyrodiversity promotes interaction complementarity and population resistance.

Theory predicts that network characteristics may help anticipate how populations and communities respond to extreme climatic events, but local environmental context may also influence responses to extreme events. For example, altered fire regimes in many ecosystems may significantly affect the context for how species and communities respond to changing climate. In this study, I tested whether the responses of a pollinator community to extreme drought were influenced by the surrounding diversity of fire histories (pyrodiversity) which can influence their interaction networks via changing partner availability. I found that at the community level, pyrodiverse landscapes promote functional complementarity and generalization, but did not consistently enhance functional redundancy or resistance to simulated co-extinction cascades. Pyrodiversity instead supported flexible behaviors that enable populations to resist perturbations. Specifically, pollinators that can shift partners and network niches are better able to take advantage of the heterogeneity generated by pyrodiversity, thereby buffering pollinator populations against changes in plant abundances. These findings suggest that pyrodiversity is unlikely to improve community-level resistance to droughts, but instead promotes population resistance and community functionality. This study provides unique evidence that resistance to extreme climatic events depends on both network properties and historical environmental context

In search for multifunctionality. The contribution of scenic landscape assessment

The attention recently paid to ecosystem services, which include cultural services, such as spiritual and aes-thetic experiences, seems to encourage the consideration of landscape scenic values into rural development policies. However, existing theoretical frameworks doesn't clarify enough the differences between various landscape services, among which potential conflicts - deriving from multiple values related to the same spatial assets - may arise. A sound assessment of landscape services is necessary. The chapter aims to show that multifunctionality is a goal-oriented concept and an option, non to be considered an intrinsic character of landscape policies. Rural, environmental, landscape and spatial policies can partially share certain strategic objectives, spatial targets, and evaluation frameworks. The paper illustrates existing techniques (as well as original proposals) for supporting landscape and rural policies through scenic landscape assessment, particularly: detailing categories of cultural services related to landscape amenity and developing scenic landscape indicators for environmental assessment frameworks. The second part of the chapter illustrates methodologies for the assessment of scenic landscape, their application in spatial planning and their potential application in rural policies, based on the Authors' research experiences on cultural landscapes in Italy. Evidence gained through the cases studies indicates that landscape scenic beauty can be protected and enhanced by integrating landscape and rural policies. The paper drafts a theoretical framework and illustrates the practical outcomes by a wide range of possible planning measure