scholarly journals Earthworm invasion causes declines across soil fauna size classes and biodiversity facets in northern North American forests

Oikos ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malte Jochum ◽  
Olga Ferlian ◽  
Madhav P. Thakur ◽  
Marcel Ciobanu ◽  
Bernhard Klarner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
North American ◽  
Soil Fauna ◽  
Size Classes ◽  
Earthworm Invasion

scholarly journals Ecosystem responses to exotic earthworm invasion in northern North American forests

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nico Eisenhauer ◽  
Olga Ferlian ◽  
Dylan Craven ◽  
Jes Hines ◽  
Malte Jochum
Keyword(s):  
North American ◽  
Ecosystem Functioning ◽  
Soil Fauna ◽  
Ecosystem Processes ◽  
Global Scale ◽  
Ecosystem Responses ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Exotic Earthworms ◽  
Meta Analyses ◽  
Gains And Losses

Earth is experiencing a substantial loss of biodiversity at the global scale, while both species gains and losses are occurring at local and regional scales. The influence of these nonrandom changes in species distributions could profoundly affect the functioning of ecosystems and the essential services that they provide. However, few experimental tests have been conducted examining the influence of species invasions on ecosystem functioning. Even fewer have been conducted using invasive ecosystem engineers, which can have disproportionately strong influence on native ecosystems relative to their own biomass. The invasion of exotic earthworms is a prime example of an ecosystem engineer that is influencing many ecosystems around the world. In particular, European earthworm invasions of northern North American forests cause simultaneous species gains and losses with significant consequences for essential ecosystem processes like nutrient cycling and crucial services to humanity like soil erosion control and carbon sequestration. Exotic earthworms are expected to select for specific traits in communities of soil microorganisms (fast-growing bacteria species), soil fauna (promoting the bacterial energy channel), and plants (graminoids) through direct and indirect effects. This will accelerate some ecosystem processes and decelerate others, fundamentally altering how invaded forests function. This project aims to investigate ecosystem responses of northern North American forests to earthworm invasion. Using a novel, synthetic combination of field observations, field experiments, lab experiments, and meta-analyses, the proposed work will be the first systematic examination of earthworm effects on (1) plant communities and (2) soil food webs and processes. Further, (3) effects of a changing climate (warming and reduced summer precipitation) on earthworm performance will be investigated in a unique field experiment designed to predict the future spread and consequences of earthworm invasion in North America. By assessing the soil chemical and physical properties as well as the taxonomic (e.g., by the latest next-generation sequencing techniques) and functional composition of plant, soil microbial and animal communities and the processes they drive in four forests, work packages I-III take complementary approaches to derive a comprehensive and generalizable picture of how ecosystems change in response to earthworm invasion. Finally, in work package IV, meta-analyses will be used to integrate the information from work packages I-III and existing literature to investigate if earthworms cause invasion waves, invasion meltdowns, habitat homogenization, and ecosystem state shifts. Global data will be synthesized to test if the relative magnitude of effects differs from place to place depending on the functional dissimilarity between native soil fauna and exotic earthworms. Moving from local to global scale, the present proposal examines the influence of earthworm invasions on biodiversity–ecosystem functioning relationships from an aboveground–belowground perspective in natural settings. This approach is highly innovative as it utilizes the invasion by exotic earthworms as an exciting model system that links invasion biology with trait-based community ecology, global change research, and ecosystem ecology, pioneering a new generation of biodiversity–ecosystem functioning research.

scholarly journals Do Invasive Earthworms Affect the Functional Traits of Native Plants?

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lise Thouvenot ◽  
Olga Ferlian ◽  
Rémy Beugnon ◽  
Tom Künne ◽  
Alfred Lochner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Functional Groups ◽  
Plant Community ◽  
Functional Traits ◽  
North American ◽  
Native Plants ◽  
Plant Biomass ◽  
Grass Species ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
Community Changes

As ecosystem engineers, invasive earthworms are one of the main drivers of plant community changes in North American forests previously devoid of earthworms. One explanation for these community changes is the effects of earthworms on the reproduction, recruitment, and development of plant species. However, few studies have investigated functional trait responses of native plants to earthworm invasion to explain the mechanisms underlying community changes. In a mesocosm (Ecotron) experiment, we set up a plant community composed of two herb and two grass species commonly found in northern North American forests under two earthworm treatments (presence vs. absence). We measured earthworm effects on above- and belowground plant biomass and functional traits after 3 months of experiment. Our results showed that earthworm presence did not significantly affect plant community biomass and cover. Furthermore, only four out of the fifteen above- and belowground traits measured were affected by earthworm presence. While some traits, such as the production of ramets, the carbon and nitrogen content of leaves, responded similarly between and within functional groups in the presence or absence of earthworms, we observed opposite responses for other traits, such as height, specific leaf area, and root length within some functional groups in the presence of earthworms. Plant trait responses were thus species-specific, although the two grass species showed a more pronounced response to earthworm presence with changes in their leaf traits than herb species. Overall, earthworms affected some functional traits related to resource uptake abilities of plants and thus could change plant competition outcomes over time, which could be an explanation of plant community changes observed in invaded ecosystems.

Size classes of flow-transverse bedforms in a subtidal environment, Nantucket Shoals, North American Atlantic shelf

1981 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert G. Mann ◽  
Donald J. P. Swift ◽  
Richard Perry
Keyword(s):  
North American ◽  
Size Classes ◽  
Subtidal Environment

Dietary flexibility aids Asian earthworm invasion in North American forests

Ecology ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 91 (7) ◽  
pp. 2070-2079 ◽  
Author(s):  
Weixin Zhang ◽  
Paul F. Hendrix ◽  
Bruce A. Snyder ◽  
Marirosa Molina ◽  
Jianxiong Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
North American ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Dietary Flexibility

scholarly journals The distinctive theropod assemblage of the Ellisdale site of New Jersey and its implications for North American dinosaur ecology and evolution during the Cretaceous

2018 ◽  
Vol 92 (6) ◽  
pp. 1115-1129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chase D. Brownstein
Keyword(s):  
New Jersey ◽  
Coastal Plain ◽  
North American ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Atlantic Coastal Plain ◽  
Theropod Dinosaur ◽  
Size Classes ◽  
The Past ◽  
Atlantic Coastal

AbstractThe Cretaceous landmass of Appalachia has preserved an understudied but nevertheless important record of dinosaurs that has recently come under some attention. In the past few years, the vertebrate faunas of several Appalachian sites have been described. One such locality, the Ellisdale site of the Cretaceous Marshalltown Formation of New Jersey, has produced hundreds of remains assignable to dinosaurs, including those of hadrosauroids of several size classes, indeterminate ornithopods, indeterminate theropods, the teeth, cranial, and appendicular elements of dromaeosaurids, ornithomimosaurians, and tyrannosauroids, and an extensive microvertebrate assemblage. The theropod dinosaur record of the Ellisdale site is currently the most extensive and diverse known from the Campanian of Appalachia. Study of the Ellisdale theropod specimens suggests that at least four or more non-avian theropod taxa are represented at the site, including tyrannosauroids, ornithomimosaurs, several different morphotypes of dromaeosaurids that are the first of that clade described from New Jersey, and indeterminate theropods. The specimens are important for increasing current knowledge about the theropod diversity of the Atlantic Coastal Plain (ACP) during the Campanian by representing the most speciose assemblage of the group during the time in the ACP as well as for shedding light on Appalachian dinosaur ecology and biogeography generally.

THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES OF CINYGMA (EPHEMEROPTERA: HEPTAGENIIDAE)

1979 ◽  
Vol 111 (6) ◽  
pp. 675-680 ◽  
Author(s):  
D.M. Lehmkuhl
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
North American ◽  
Adult Emergence ◽  
North American Species ◽  
Key To Species ◽  
Submerged Wood ◽  
Size Classes ◽  
The North ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Distribution

AbstractA key to species for adults and figures of the three North American Cinygma are presented. New distribution records are given; the range of C. lyriformis McDunnough is extended to Alaska and the genus in the Palearctic is discussed. Nymphs are undescribed except for C. integrum (Eaton). The life history of the latter is given for Oregon. Nymphs of all size classes are present throughout the year but adult emergence is restricted to mid May to mid July. Nymphs apparently are restricted to a submerged wood habitat.

scholarly journals Implementing balanced harvesting: practical challenges and other implications

2016 ◽  
Vol 73 (6) ◽  
pp. 1690-1696 ◽  
Author(s):  
David G. Reid ◽  
Norman Graham ◽  
Petri Suuronen ◽  
Pingguo He ◽  
Michael Pol
Keyword(s):  
Fisheries Management ◽  
Threatened Species ◽  
North American ◽  
Benthic Invertebrates ◽  
Size Class ◽  
African Lakes ◽  
Size Classes ◽  
Exploitation Rate ◽  
Ecosystem Level ◽  
Developed World

Abstract Balanced harvesting (BH) has been proposed as an alternative to the paradigm of more selective fishing as practiced in most European and North American fisheries management. We examine options for the implementation of BH and evaluate the issues raised in such an implementation. Implementation is considered at the whole ecosystem level, in terms of the patterns of removal for all species, both commercial and bycatch. We suggest that a “laissez-faire” approach analogous to the African lakes where BH was first observed is inappropriate in managed developed world fisheries. We consider two further approaches: focusing on either the species caught or on the sizes of animal alone. We find that aiming to harvest all species with an exploitation rate appropriate to their productivity would require a degree of micro-management that is probably unachievable, with all captured species “choking” the fishery in sequence. The size-based approach works with an exploitation rate appropriate to the productivity at size, with no consideration of the species involved. This might superficially be easier to implement, as management would involve a limited number of size classes only. However, problems may arise due to the likely faster capture of the more easily catchable fish, and also likely targeting of the more valuable species within a size class. We identify a possible third option of “broad brush” métier-based management that may resolve some of these problems. Other issues include the management of protected, endangered, and threatened species (including mammals, reptiles, and birds), the management of already severely depleted stocks, and the capture of benthic invertebrates.

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