Feedbacks between vegetation pattern and resource loss dramatically decrease ecosystem resilience and restoration potential in a simple dryland model

Landscape Ecology

Volumn 28, Issue 5, 2013, Pages 931-942

  Mayor, Ángeles G ^a,b   Kéfi, Sonia ^c   Bautista, Susana ^d   Rodríguez, Francisco ^d   Cartení, Fabrizio ^e   Rietkerk, Max ^a  

^a UTRECHT UNIVERSITY   (Netherlands)

^b FUNDACIÓN CENTRO DE ESTUDIOS AMBIENTALES DEL MEDITERRÁNEO CEAM   (Spain)

^c INSTITUT DES SCIENCES DE L EVOLUTION   (France)

^d UNIVERSITY OF ALICANTE   (Spain)

^e UNIVERSITY OF NAPLES FEDERICO II   (Italy)

Author keywords

Desertification; Dryland ecosystems; Hydrological connectivity; Resilience; Resource leakiness feedbacks; Restoration potential; Vegetation spatial pattern

Indexed keywords

ARIDITY; DESERTIFICATION; ECOSYSTEM RESILIENCE; ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS; ENVIRONMENTAL MODELING; LANDSCAPE; VEGETATION; VEGETATION COVER; WATER;

EID: 84876971816     PISSN: 09212973     EISSN: 15729761     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1007/s10980-013-9870-4     Document Type: Article

References (60)

1. Abrahams AD, Parsons AJ, Wainwright J (1995) Effects of vegetation change on interrill runoff and erosion, Walnut-Gulch, southern Arizona. Geomorphology 13: 37-48.
2. Aguiar MR, Sala OE (1999) Patch structure, dynamics and implications for the functioning of arid ecosystems. Trends Ecol Evol 14: 273-277.
3. Allen C (2007) Interactions across spatial scales among forest dieback, fire, and erosion in northern New Mexico landscapes. Ecosystems 10(5): 797-808.
4. Bautista S, Mayor AG, Bourakhouadar J, Bellot J (2007) Plant spatial pattern predicts hillslope runoff and erosion in a semiarid Mediterranean landscape. Ecosystems 10(6): 987-998.
5. Bestelmeyer BT (2006) Threshold concepts and their use in rangeland management and restoration: the good, the bad, and the insidious. Restor Ecol 14: 325-329.
6. Bracken LJ, Croke J (2007) The concept of hydrological connectivity and its contribution to understanding runoff-dominated geomorphic systems. Hydrol Process 21: 1749-1763.
7. Brandt CJ, Thornes JB (1996) Mediterranean desertification and land use. Wiley, Chichester.
8. Breshears DD, Cobb NS, Rich PM, Price KP, Allen CD, Balice RG, Romme WH, Kastens JH, Floyd ML, Belnap J, Anderson JJ, Myers OB, Meyer CW (2005) Regional vegetation die- off in response to global-change- type drought. Proc Natl Acad Sci 102(42): 15144-15148.
9. Browning DM, Duniway MC, Laliberte AS, Rango A (2012) Hierarchical analysis of vegetation dynamics over 71 years: soil-rainfall interactions in a Chihuahuan Desert ecosystem. Ecol Appl 22(3): 909-926.
10. Cammeraat LH, Imeson AC (1999) The evolution and significance of soil-vegetation patterns following land abandonment and fire in Spain. Catena 37: 107-127.
11. Dakos V, Kéfi S, Rietkerk M, van Nes EH, Scheffer M (2011) Slowing down in spatially patterned ecosystems at the brink of collapse. Am Nat 177: E153-E166.
12. Dakos V, van Nes EH, D'odorico P, Scheffer M (2012) Robustness of variance and autocorrelation as indicators of critical slowing down. Ecology 93(2): 264-271.
13. Davenport DW, Breshears DD, Wilcox BP, Allen CD (1998) Viewpoint: sustainability of piñon-juniper ecosystems-a unifying perspective of soil erosion thresholds. J Rangeland Manage 51: 231-240.
14. Deblauwe V, Barbier N, Couteron P, Lejeune O, Bogaert J (2008) The global biogeography of semi-arid periodic vegetation patterns. Glob Ecol Biogeogr 17: 715-723.
15. Dunkerley DL, Brown KJ (1995) Runoff and runon areas in a patterned chenopod shrubland, arid western New South Wales, Australia: Characteristics and origin. J Arid Environ 30: 41-55.
16. Elwell HA, Stocking MA (1976) Vegetal cover to estimate soil erosion hazard in Rhodesia. Geoderma 15: 61-70.
17. Foley JA, Coe MT, Scheffer M, Wang G (2003) Regime shifts in the Sahara and Sahel: Interactions between ecological and climatic systems in Northern Africa.
18. Francis CF, Thornes JB (1990) Runoff hydrographs from three Mediterranean vegetations cover types. In: Thornes JB (ed) Vegetation and erosion, processes and environments. Wiley, Chichester, pp 363-384.
19. Franz TE, Caylor KK, King EG, Nordbotten J, Celia MA, Rodriguez-Iturbe I (2012) An ecohydrological approach to predicting hillslope-scale vegetation patterns in dryland ecosystems. Water Resour Res. doi: 10. 1029/2011WR010524.
20. Gao Y, Zhong B, Yue H, Wu B, Cao S (2011) A degradation threshold for irreversible loss of soil productivity: a long-term case study in China. J Appl Ecol 48: 1145-1154.
21. García-Fayos P, Bochet E, Cerdà A (2010) Seed removal susceptibility through soil erosion shapes vegetation composition. Plant Soil 334: 289-297.
22. Helldén U (2008) A coupled human-environment model for desertification simulation and impact Studies. Glob Planet Change 64: 158-168.
23. Hillerislambers R, Rietkerk M, van den Bosch F, Prins HHT, de Kroon H (2001) Vegetation pattern formation in semi-arid grazing systems. Ecology 82(1): 50-61.
24. Holling CS (1973) Resilience and stability of ecological systems. Annu Rev Ecol Syst 4: 1-23.
25. Holm AM, Loneragan WA, Adams MA (2002) Do variations on a model of landscape function assist in interpreting the growth response of vegetation to rainfall in arid environments? J Arid Environ 50(1): 23-52.
26. Kéfi S, Rietkerk M, van Baalen M, Loreau M (2007a) Local facilitation, bistability and transitions in arid ecosystems. Theor Popul Biol 71: 367-379.
27. Kéfi S, Rietkerk M, Alados CL, Pueyo Y, Papanastasis VP, ElAich A, de Ruiter PC (2007b) Spatial vegetation patterns and imminent desertification in Mediterranean arid ecosystems. Nature 449: 213-217.
28. Kéfi S, Eppinga MB, de Ruiter PC, Rietkerk M (2010) Bistability and regular spatial patterns in arid ecosystems. Theor Ecol 3(4): 257-269.
29. Kéfi S, Rietkerk M, Roy M, Franc A, de Ruiter PC, Pascual M (2011) Robust scaling in ecosystems and the meltdown of patch size distributions before extinction. Ecol Lett 14: 29-35.
30. King EG, Franz TE, Caylor KK (2011) Ecohydrological interactions in a two-phase mosaic dryland: Implications for regime shifts, resilience, and restoration. Ecohydrology 5(6): 733-745.
31. Lindegren M, Dakos V, Gröger JP, Gårdmark A, Kornilovs G, Otto SA, Möllmann C (2012) Early detection of ecosystem regime shifts: a multiple method evaluation for management application. PLoS ONE 7(7): e38410. doi: 10. 1371/journal. pone. 0038410.
32. Ludwig JA, Tongway DJ (1995) Spatial organisation of landscapes and its function in semi-arid woodlands, Australia. Landscape Ecol 10: 51-63.
33. Ludwig JA, Tongway D, Freudenberger D, Noble J, Hodgkinson K (eds) (1997) Landscape ecology function and management: Principles from Australia's rangelands. Melbourne (Australia), CSIRO.
34. Ludwig JA, Bastin GN, Chewings VH, Eagerc RW, Liedloff AC (2007) Leakiness: a new index for monitoring the health of arid and semiarid landscapes using remotely sensed vegetation cover and elevation data. Ecol Ind 7(2): 442-454.
35. Maestre FT, Escudero A (2009) Is the patch size distribution of vegetation a suitable indicator of desertification processes? Ecology 90(7): 1729-1735.
36. Manor A, Shnerb NM (2008) Facilitation, competition, and vegetation patchiness: from scale free distribution to patterns. J Theor Biol 253(4): 838-842.
37. Mayor AG, Bautista S, Small EE, Dixon M, Bellot J (2008) Measurement of the connectivity of runoff source areas as determined by vegetation pattern and topography. A tool for assessing potential water and soil losses in drylands. Water Resour Res 44: W10423.
38. Mayor AG, Bautista S, Bellot J (2009) Factors and interactions controlling infiltration, runoff, and soil loss at the microscale in a patchy Mediterranean semiarid landscape. Earth Surf Process Landf 34: 1702-1711.
39. Mayor AG, Bautista S, Bellot J (2011) Scale-dependent variation in runoff and sediment yield in a semiarid Mediterranean catchment. J Hydrol 397: 128-135.
40. McIvor JG, Ash AJ, Cook GD (1995) Land condition in the tropical tallgrass pasture lands. 1. Effects on herbage production. Rangeland J 17(1): 69-85.
41. Moreno-de las Heras M, Saco PM, Willgoose GR, Tongway DJ (2011). Assessing landscape structure and pattern fragmentation in semiarid ecosystems using patch-size distributions. Ecol Appl 21(7): 2793-2805.
42. Muñoz-Robles C, Tighe M, Reid N, Frazier P, Briggs SV, Wilson B (2011) A two-step up-scaling method for mapping runoff and sediment production from pasture and woody encroachment on semi-arid hillslopes. Ecohydrol. doi: 10. 1002/eco. 283.
43. Okin GS, Parsons AJ, Wainwright J, Herrick JE, Bestelmeyer BT, Peters DC (2009) Do changes in connectivity explain desertification? Bioscience 59(3): 237-244.
44. Peters DC, Pielke RA, Bestelmeyer BT, Allen CD, Munson-McGee S, Havstad KM, Mooney HA (2004) Cross-scale interactions, nonlinearities, and forecasting catastrophic events. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 101(42): 15130-15135.
45. Puigdefábregas J (2005) The role of vegetation patterns in structuring runoff and sediment fluxes in drylands. Earth Surf Proc Land 30: 133-147.
46. Puigdefábregas J, Solé A, Gutiérrez L, Del Barrio G, Boer MM (1999) Scales and processes of water and sediment redistribution in drylands: results from the Rambla Honda field site in Southeast Spain. Earth-Sci Rev 48: 39-70.
47. Ravi S, Breshears DD, Huxman TE, D'Odorico P (2010) Land degradation in drylands: Interactions among hydrologic-aeolian erosion and vegetation dynamics 116(3-4): 236-245.
48. Reid KD, Wilcox B, Breshears D, MacDonald L (1999) Runoff and erosion in a piñon-juniper woodland: Influence of vegetation patches. Soil Sci Soc Am J 63: 1869-1879.
49. Rietkerk M, van de Koppel J (1997) Alternate stable states and threshold effects in semi-arid grazing. Oikos 79(1): 69-76.
50. Rietkerk M, Boerlijst MC, van Langevelde F, HilleRisLambers R, van de Koppel J, Kumar L, Prins HHT, de Roos AM (2002) Self-organization of vegetation in arid ecosystems. Am Nat 160(4): 524-530.
51. Rietkerk M, Dekker SC, de Ruiter PC, van de Koppel J (2004) Self-organized patchiness and catastrophic shifts in ecosystems. Science 305: 1926-1929.
52. Moreno-de las Heras M, Saco PM, Willgoose GR, Tongway DJ (2012). Variations in hydrological connectivity of Australian semiarid landscapes indicate abrupt changes in rainfall-use efficiency of vegetation. J Geophys Res Biogeosci 117. doi: 10. 1029/2011JG001839.
53. Scanlon TM, Caylor KK, Levin SA, Rodriguez-Iturbe I (2007) Positive feedbacks promote power-law clustering of Kalahari vegetation. Nature 449: 209-212.
54. Scheffer M, Bascompte J, Brock WA, Brovkin V, Carpenter SR, Dakos V, Held H, van Nes EH, Rietkerk M, Sugihara G (2009) Early-warning signals for critical transitions. Nature 461: 53-59.
55. Schröter D, Cramer W, Leemans R, Prentice IC, Araújo MB, Arnell NW, Bondeau A, Bugmann H, Carter TR, Gracia CA, de la Vega-Leinert AC, Erhard M, Ewert F, Glendining M, House JI, Kankaanpää S, Klein RJT, Lavorel S, Lindner M, Metzger MJ, Meyer J, Mitchell TD, Reginster I, Rounsevell M, Sabaté S, Sitch S, Smith B, Smith J, Smith P, Sykes MT, Thonicke K, Thuiller W, Tuck G, Zaehle S, Zierl B (2005) Ecosystem service supply and vulnerability to global change in Europe. Science 310: 1333-1337.
56. Turnbull L, Wainwright J, Brazier RE (2010) Changes in hydrology and erosion over a transition from grassland to shrubland. Hydrol Process 24(4): 393-414.
57. Urgeghe AM, Breshears DD, Martens SN, Beeson PC (2010) Redistribution of runoff among vegetation patch types: on ecohydrological optimality of herbaceous capture of run-on. Rangeland Ecol Manage 63(5): 497-504.
58. von Hardenberg J, Meron E, Shachak M, Zarmi Y (2001) Diversity of vegetation patterns and desertification. Phys Rev Lett 87: 198101.
59. von Hardenberg J, Kletter AY, Yizhaq H, Nathan J, Meron E (2010) Periodic versus scale-free patterns in dryland vegetation. Proc R Soc 277: 1771-1776.
60. Wilcox BP, Breshears DD, Allen CD (2003) Ecohydrology of a resource-conserving semiarid woodland: effects of scale and disturbance. Ecol Monogr 73: 223-239.