Water availability, bedrock, disturbance by herbivores, and climate determine plant diversity in South‑African savanna

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F60077344%3A_____%2F22%3A00562145" target="_blank" >RIV/60077344:_____/22:00562145 - isvavai.cz</a>

Alternative codes found

RIV/67985939:_____/22:00562145 RIV/00216208:11310/22:10446302 RIV/00216208:11620/22:10446302

Result on the web

<a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-02870-3" target="_blank" >https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-02870-3</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-02870-3" target="_blank" >10.1038/s41598-021-02870-3</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Water availability, bedrock, disturbance by herbivores, and climate determine plant diversity in South‑African savanna

Original language description

To identify factors that drive plant species richness in South‑African savanna and explore their relativeimportance, we sampled plant communities across habitats differing in water availability, disturbance,and bedrock, using the Kruger National Park as a model system. We made plant inventories in 60plots of 50 × 50 m, located in three distinct habitats: (i) at perennial rivers, (ii) at seasonal rivers withwater available only during the rainy season, and (iii) on crests, at least ~ 5 km away from any watersource. We predicted that large herbivores would utilise seasonal rivers’ habitats less intensely thanthose along perennial rivers where water is available throughout the year, including dry periods.Plots on granite harboured more herbaceous and shrub species than plots on basalt. The dry crestswere poorer in herb species than both seasonal and perennial rivers. Seasonal rivers harboured thehighest numbers of shrub species, in accordance with the prediction of the highest species richnessat relatively low levels of disturbance and low stress from the lack of water. The crests, exposedto relatively low pressure from grazing but stressed by the lack of water, are important from theconservation perspective because they harbour typical, sometimes rare savanna species, and so areseasonal rivers whose shrub richness is stimulated and maintained by the combination of moderatedisturbance imposed by herbivores and position in the middle of the water availability gradient. Tocapture the complexity of determinants of species richness in KNP, we complemented the analysis ofthe above local factors by exploring large‑scale factors related to climate, vegetation productivity,the character of dominant vegetation, and landscape features. The strongest factor was temperature,areas with the highest temperatures reveal lower species richness. Our results also suggest thatColophospermum mopane, a dominant woody species in the north of KNP is not the ultimate cause ofthe lower plant diversity in this part of the park.

Czech name

—

Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

—

OECD FORD branch

10611 - Plant sciences, botany

Project

<a href="/en/project/GA18-18495S" target="_blank" >GA18-18495S: Biodiversity maintenance in African savanna: How to deal with severe top-down and bottom-up effects?</a><br>

Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2022

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Scientific Reports

ISSN

2045-2322

e-ISSN

2045-2322

Volume of the periodical

12

Issue of the periodical within the volume

1

Country of publishing house

GB - UNITED KINGDOM

Number of pages

19

Pages from-to

338

UT code for WoS article

000741645800120

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85122922484