Vegetation Release Eight Years After Removal of Lonicera maackii in West-Central Ohio

Author Institution:Dept of Biological Sciences, Wright State UniversityLonicera maackii is thought to inhibit growth of herbaceous vegetation and woody seedlings. To determine the extent of this inhibition, in April 1996, Lonicera was removed from ten 30 x 30 m areas within Sugarcreek Reserve. Paired 20 x 20 m plots were established, one of each pair in the removal area and one adjacent to that area. These plots varied in history and topographic position. Twenty 1-m2 small plots were established in each large plot and sampled for herbaceous vegetation (by species and cover class) and woody seedlings (species and number). Sampling was done summer 1996 and spring 1997. Nine of the paired plots were resampled summer 2003 and spring 2004. Few differences were found between control and treated plots the first year after Lonicera removal. Significant differences between control and treated plots were found seven to eight years after treatment in both spring and summer: treated plots had higher species richness, higher cover, and higher tree seedling densities. These results indicate that Lonicera removal can enhance ground layer species diversity and cover after a lag period of at least one year

LANDSCAPE CHANGE AND HUMAN-ENVIRONMENT INTERACTIONS: IMPLICATIONS FOR NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT IN URBANIZING AREAS

Worldwide changes in land use and land cover alter the spatial distributions of natural resources and ecosystem functions. Here I examined the pattern and process of landscape change in the Charlotte, North Carolina metropolitan region, to understand how these changes originate from and have influence on human decisions regarding land management and policy formation. First, I simulated future landscape patterns that could arise from conservation-based land use policies and assessed the potential impacts to priority natural resources and landscape composition. Second, I analyzed the process of landscape change as it originates with the decisions of individual forest owners by utilizing a unique combination of individual, site, and landscape level data within a structural equation modeling framework. Third, I used a stated preference survey to examine how those individual decisions may change with new global markets for biofuels. My findings highlight the importance of considering landscape change as a multi-scale process with integrated human, environmental, and spatial components. Advancing our understanding of these processes will support planning organizations at local to regional levels in developing sustainable natural resource management plans that are in line with societal values while preserving biodiversity and ecosystem function

Payments for Carbon Sequestration to Alleviate Development Pressure in a Rapidly Urbanizing Region

The purpose of this study was to determine individuals’ willingness to enroll in voluntary payments for carbon sequestration programs through the use of a discrete choice experiment delivered to forest owners living in the rapidly urbanizing region surrounding Charlotte, North Carolina. We examined forest owners’ willingness to enroll in payments for carbon sequestration policies under different levels of financial incentives (annual revenue), different contract lengths and different program administrators (e.g., private companies versus a state or federal agency). We also examined the influence forest owners’ sense of place had on their willingness to enroll in hypothetical programs. Our results showed a high level of ambivalence towards participating in payments for carbon sequestration programs. However, both financial incentives and contract lengths significantly influenced forest owners’ intent to enroll. Neither program administration nor forest owners’ sense of place influenced intent to enroll. While our analyses indicated payments from carbon sequestration programs are not currently competitive with the monetary returns expected from timber harvest or property sales, certain forest owners might see payments for carbon sequestration programs as a viable option for offsetting increasing tax costs as development encroaches and property values rise

Aesthetic Characteristics of the Front Range: An Analysis of Viewsheds Provided by Boulder OSMP Lands

The city of Boulder’s Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP) lands offer residents and visitors a variety of unique recreational, scenic, and cultural experiences that are often captured and shared publicly via social media. Given the diversity of OSMP lands, visitor experiences likely differ based on the aesthetic and biophysical features that can be viewed from these landscapes. For instance, the peaks of the iconic Flatirons provide visitors with different scenic views than the low-lying grasslands in the southeastern area of the city. Furthermore, visitor use and enjoyment of OSMP lands could be directly related to the landscape features that are visible from these different locations. Understanding how visible landscape features vary across OSMP lands can help managers target their planning efforts to improve the quality of outdoor recreation experiences, and potentially identify new locations for outdoor recreation infrastructure (e.g., trails, pavilions, etc.) that offer the ability to see the regions most desirable landscape features. This study: (1) identifies points in the landscape where users are often inspired to take photographs; (2) maps the landscapes most often viewed by visitors; (3) summarizes the types of landscape features viewed from OSMP lands; and (4) determines how these landscape features vary across LCAs

Landscape Values and Aesthetic Preferences Across the Front Range

Boulder’s Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP) lands are managed to provide a diverse set of benefits valued by Boulder’s residents as well as tourists. Not all OSMP lands provide the same set of benefits however. Understanding how the values associated with OSMP lands vary across the region can provide managers with insights into how best to allocate resources so that they yield the maximum public benefit. In addition to an understanding of the values visitors associate with OSMP lands, management can benefit from knowledge of how different features of the landscape impact user experiences, both positively and negatively

A mixed-methods analysis of social-ecological feedbacks between urbanization and forest persistence

We examined how social-ecological factors in the land-change decision-making process influenced neighboring decisions and trajectories of alternative landscape ecologies. We decomposed individual landowner decisions to conserve or develop forests in the rapidly growing Charlotte, North Carolina, U. S. region, exposing and quantifying the effects of forest quality, and social and cultural dynamics. We tested the hypothesis that the intrinsic value of forest resources, e. g., cultural attachment to land, influence woodland owners' propensity to sell. Data were collected from a sample of urban, nonindustrial private forest (U-NIPF) owners using an individualized survey design that spatially matched land-owner responses to the ecological and timber values of their forest stands. Cluster analysis (n = 126) revealed four woodland owner typologies with widely ranging views on the ecosystem, cultural, and historical values of their forests. Classification tree analysis revealed woodland owners' willingness to sell was characterized by nonlinear, interactive factors, including sense of place values regarding the retention of native vegetation, the size of forest holdings, their connectedness to nature, 'pressure' from surrounding development, and behavioral patterns, such as how often landowners visit their land. Several ecological values and economic factors were not found to figure in the decision to retain forests. Our study design is unique in that we address metropolitan forest persistence across urban-rural and population gradients using a unique individualized survey design that richly contextualizes survey responses. Understanding the interplay between policies and landowner behavior can also help resource managers to better manage and promote forest persistence. Given the region's paucity of policy tools to manage the type and amount of development, the mosaic of land cover the region currently enjoys is far from stable

Modeling Landowner Interactions and Development Patterns at the Urban Fringe

Population growth and unrestricted development policies are driving low-density urbanization and fragmentation of peri-urban landscapes across North America. While private individuals own most undeveloped land, little is known about how their decision-making processes shape landscape-scale patterns of urbanization over time. We introduce a hybrid agent-based modeling (ABM) – cellular automata (CA) modeling approach, developed for analyzing dynamic feedbacks between landowners’ decisions to sell their land for development, and resulting patterns of landscape fragmentation. Our modeling approach builds on existing conceptual frameworks in land systems modeling by integrating an ABM into an established grid-based land-change model – FUTURES. The decision-making process within the ABM involves landowner agents whose decision to sell their land to developers is a function of heterogeneous preferences and peer-influences (i.e., spatial neighborhood relationships). Simulating landowners’ decision to sell allows an operational link between the ABM and the CA module. To test our hybrid ABM-CA approach, we used empirical data for a rapidly growing region in North Carolina for parameterization. We conducted a sensitivity analysis focusing on the two most relevant parameters—spatial actor distribution and peer-influence intensity—and evaluated the dynamic behavior of the model simulations. The simulation results indicate different peer-influence intensities lead to variable landscape fragmentation patterns, suggesting patterns of spatial interaction among landowners indirectly affect landscape-scale patterns of urbanization and the fragmentation of undeveloped forest and farmland

Impact of the Invasive Species Lonicera maackii on Individual Plants and Plant Community Structure

Control of the invasive shrub Lonicera maackii, commonly known as bush honeysuckle, poses a serious problem for managers of nature reserves across the Midwestern United States. Lonicera maackii is an invader of forest and open environments. It grows best in high light areas, including canopy gaps, forest edges, and disturbed forests (Nyboer, 1992; Hutchinson and Vankat, 1997; Luken, 1998). It is unlikely to be found in old-growth forests even when the forest is adjacent to an invaded area (Hutchinson and Vankat, 1998)

Leaf and Root Extracts of the Invasive Shrub, Lonicera maackii, Inhibit Seed Germination of Three Herbs with no Autotoxic Effects

In addition to effects mediated by resource competition, some invasive plants may impact surrounding vegetation by secreting compounds that are directly inhibitory to growth. Lonicera maackii, an invasive Asian shrub of forests and open areas in eastern and midwestern North America, has devastating effects on understory vegetation, some of which persist even after this shrub is removed. In this study, we explored the potential of aqueous extracts of the leaves and roots of this plant to inhibit seed germination of Impatiens capensis, Alliaria petiolata, Arabidopsis thaliana, and L. maackii in Petri dish bioassays. Both L. maackii root and leaf extracts significantly decreased germination in the three herb species. This inhibitory effect generally increased with increasing extract concentration and was more pronounced with application of leaf extract than root extract. However, when the same extracts were applied to seeds of L. maackii itself, germination was delayed in some cases, but was not significantly reduced by the end of the experiment. Germination of L. maackii seeds even reached significantly higher levels in some extract treatments than in no-extract controls. This implies that L. maackii can successfully inhibit the germination of other plants with few autotoxic effects and may even promote the germination of its own seeds

Direct and Indirect Effects of Conditioned Soils and Tissue Extracts of the Invasive Shrub, Lonicera Maackii, on Target Plant Performance

Lonicera maackii is an invasive Asian shrub naturalized in North America that has negative effects on forest understory vegetation. Aqueous extracts of leaves and roots of this plant have been shown to inhibit germination of several species. In this study, we examined the extent to which field-collected soils conditioned by L. maackii growth, with and without additions of L. maackii extracts, had effects on growth, morphology, and reproduction of Arabidopsis thaliana in a greenhouse setting. We also examined the effects of nutrient addition to the same soils on the performance of A. thaliana, whether plant responses to nutrients varied among L. maackii-conditioned and -unconditioned soils, and whether the effects of L. maackii extracts varied in soils with different histories and fertility. Plants grown in forest soil collected from a site where L. maackii was present grew slower and flowered later than plants grown in an unconditioned soil, but ended up being larger, with more leaves, branches and a higher total seed output. Nutrient addition had a positive effect on performance of A. thaliana, but when nutrients were added with extracts of L. maackii roots and leaves, the positive effects of nutrients were greatly diminished. Inhibiting plant responses to resource opportunities is a potentially important indirect effect of allelochemicals. Where direct effects of extracts on growth were seen, leaf extracts had a greater effect than root extracts. While the most important impacts of L. maackii in the field are undoubtedly due to competition for light and moisture, evidence for allelopathic effects of this plant is growing