Land management trumps the effects of climate change and elevated CO2 on grassland functioning

Journal of Ecology

Volumn 102, Issue 4, 2014, Pages 896-904

  Thébault, Aurélie ^a,b,c   Mariotte, Pierre ^d   Lortie, Christopher J ^e   Macdougall, Andrew S ^c  

^a EPFL   (Switzerland)

^b SWISS FEDERAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE WSL   (Switzerland)

^c UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH   (Canada)

^d UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

^e YORK UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

Climate change; Ecosystem services; Factor interaction; Grasslands; Land management practices; Meta analysis

Indexed keywords

ANTHROPOGENIC SOURCE; BIOLOGICAL PRODUCTION; CARBON DIOXIDE; CLIMATE CHANGE; COMMUNITY RESPONSE; DEFOLIATION; ECOSYSTEM FUNCTION; ECOSYSTEM SERVICE; GLOBAL CHANGE; GRASSLAND; LAND MANAGEMENT; MANAGEMENT PRACTICE; META-ANALYSIS; PLANT COMMUNITY; PRIMARY PRODUCTION; SOIL PROFILE;

EID: 84902965025     PISSN: 00220477     EISSN: 13652745     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/1365-2745.12236     Document Type: Article

References (87)

1. Adams, D.C., Gurevitch, J. & Rosenberg, M.S. (1997) Resampling tests for meta-analysis of ecological data. Ecology, 78, 1277-1283.
2. Aerts, R. (2006) The freezer defrosting: global warming and litter decomposition rates in cold biomes. Journal of Ecology, 94, 713-724.
3. Allan, E., Bossdorf, O., Dormann, C.F., Prati, D., Gossner, M.M., Tscharntke, T. et al. (2014) Interannual variation in land-use intensity enhances grassland multidiversity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 111, 308-313.
4. Anderson, N.J., Dietz, R.D. & Engstrom, D.R. (2013) Land-use change, not climate, controls organic carbon burial in lakes. Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B, Biological Sciences, 280, 20131278.
5. Axelrod, D.I. (1985) Rise of the grassland biome, central North-America. Botanical Review, 51, 163-201.
6. Bakker, E.S., Ritchie, M.E., Olff, H., Milchunas, D.G. & Knops, J.M.H. (2006) Herbivore impact on grassland plant diversity depends on habitat productivity and herbivore size. Ecology Letters, 9, 780-788.
7. Borenstein, M., Hedges, L.V., Higgins, J.P.T. & Rothstein, H.R. (2010) A basic introduction to fixed-effect and random-effects models for meta-analysis. Research Synthesis Methods, 1, 97-111.
8. Brooker, R., Kikvidze, Z., Pugnaire, F.I., Callaway, R.M., Choler, P., Lortie, C.J. & Michalet, R. (2005) The importance of importance. Oikos, 109, 63-70.
9. Brooker, R.W., Callaway, R.M., Cavieres, L.A., Kikvidze, Z., Lortie, C.J., Michalet, R., Pugnaire, F., Valiente-Banuet, A. & Whitham, T.G. (2009) Don't diss integration: a comment on Ricklefs's disintegrating communities. The American Naturalist, 174, 919-927.
10. Burke, I.C., Yonker, C.M., Parton, W.J., Cole, C.V., Schimel, D.S. & Flach, K. (1989) Texture, climate, and cultivation effects on soil organic matter content in US grassland soils. Soil Science Society of America Journal, 53, 800-805.
11. Cadotte, M., Mehrkens, L.R. & Menge, D.N.L. (2012) Gauging the impact of meta-analysis on ecology. Evolutionary Ecology, 26, 1153-1167.
12. Carpenter, S.R., DeFries, R., Dietz, T., Mooney, H.A., Polasky, S., Reid, W.V. & Scholes, R.J. (2006) Millennium ecosystem assessment: research needs. Science, 314, 257-258.
13. Chapin, F.S. III, Matson, P.A. & Mooney, H.A. (2002) Principles of Terrestrial Ecosystem Ecology. Springer-Verlag, New York, NY.
14. Chapin, F.S. III, Zavaleta, E.S., Eviner, V.T., Naylor, R.L., Vitousek, P.M., Reynolds, H.L. et al. (2000) Consequences of changing biodiversity. Nature, 405, 234-242.
15. Chaudhary, V.B., Walters, L.L., Bever, J.D., Hoeksema, J.D. & Wilson, G.W.T. (2010) Advancing synthetic ecology: a database system to facilitate complex ecological meta-analyses. Bulletin Ecological Society of America, 91, 235-243.
16. Clark, C.M. & Tilman, D. (2008) Loss of plant species after chronic low-level nitrogen deposition to prairie grasslands. Nature, 451, 712-715.
17. Cornwell, W.K., Cornelissen, J.H.C., Amatangelo, K., Dorrepaal, E., Eviner, V.T., Godoy, O. et al. (2008) Plant species traits are the predominant control on litter decomposition rates within biomes worldwide. Ecology Letters, 11, 1065-1071.
18. Craine, J.M., Ocheltree, T.W., Nippert, J.B., Towne, E.G., Skibbe, A.M., Kembel, S.W. & Fargione, J.E. (2012) Global diversity of drought tolerance and grassland climate-change resilience. Nature Climate Change, 3, 63-67.
19. 2 and climate change: results from six dynamic global vegetation models. Global Change Biology, 7, 357-373.
20. De Sassi, C. & Tilianakis, J.M. (2012) Climate change disproportionately increases herbivore over plant or parasitoid biomass. PLoS ONE, 7, e40557.
21. Del Grosso, S.J., Parton, W.J., Stohlgren, T., Zheng, D., Bachelet, D., Prince, S., Hibbard, K. & Olson, R. (2008) Global net primary production predicted from vegetation class, precipitation, and temperature. Ecology, 89, 2117-2126.
22. R Development Core Team (2011) R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria.
23. 2 and temperature. Global Change Biology, 18, 2681-2693.
24. Ellis, E.C. & Ramankutty, N. (2008) Putting people in the map: anthropogenic biomes of the world. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, 6, 439-447.
25. Epstein, H.E., Burke, I.C. & Lauenroth, W.K. (2002) Regional patterns of decomposition and primary production rates in the US Great Plains. Ecology, 83, 320-327.
26. Fang, J.Y., Piao, S.L., Tang, Z.Y., Peng, C.H. & Wei, J. (2001) Interannual variability in net primary production and precipitation. Science, 293, U1-U2.
27. Feddema, J.J., Oleson, K.W., Bonan, G.B., Mearns, L.O., Buja, L.E., Meehl, G.A. & Washington, W.M. (2005) The importance of land-cover change in simulating future climates. Science, 310, 1674-1678.
28. Flanagan, L.B. & Johnson, B.G. (2005) Interacting effects of temperature, soil moisture and plant biomass production on ecosystem respiration in a northern temperate grassland. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 130, 237-253.
29. Foley, J.A., DeFries, R., Asner, G.P., Barford, C., Bonan, G., Carpenter, S.R. et al. (2005) Global consequences of land use. Science, 309, 570-574.
30. Fortunel, C., Garnier, E., Joffre, R., Kazakou, E., Quested, H., Grigulis, K. et al. (2009) Leaf traits capture the effects of land use changes and climate on litter decomposability of grasslands across Europe. Ecology, 90, 598-611.
31. Gholz, H.L., Wedin, D.A., Smitherman, S.M., Harmon, M.E. & Parton, W.J. (2000) Long-term dynamics of pine and hardwood litter decomposition in contrasting environments: toward a global model of decomposition. Global Change Biology, 6, 751-765.
32. Gibson, D. (2009) Grasses and Grassland Ecology. Oxford University Press, New York, NY.
33. Grace, J.B. (2006) Structural Equation Modeling and Natural Systems. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.
34. Grace, J.B., Anderson, T.M., Olff, H. & Scheiner, S.M. (2010) On the specification of structural equation models for ecological systems. Ecological Monographs, 80, 67-87.
35. Grime, J.P., Brown, V.K., Thompson, K., Masters, G.J., Hillier, S.H., Clarke, I.P. et al. (2000) The response of two contrasting limestone grasslands to simulated climate change. Science, 289, 762-765.
36. Guo, L. & Gifford, R. (2002) Soil carbon stocks and land use change: a meta analysis. Global Change Biology, 8, 345-360.
37. Harpole, W.S. & Tilman, D. (2007) Grassland species loss resulting from reduced niche dimension. Nature, 446, 791-793.
38. Harrison, F. (2011) Getting started with meta-analysis. Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 2, 1-10.
39. Hedges, L.V., Gurevitch, J. & Curtis, P.S. (1999) The meta-analysis of response ratios in experimental ecology. Ecology, 80, 1150-1156.
40. 2, N deposition and climate change on plant litter quality in a California annual grassland. Oecologia, 142, 465-473.
41. Hillebrand, H., Gruner, D.S., Borer, E.T., Bracken, M.E.S., Cleland, E.E., Elser, J.J. et al. (2007) Consumer versus resource control of producer diversity depends on ecosystem type and producer community structure. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 104, 10904-10909.
42. Hobbie, S.E. (1996) Temperature and plant species control over litter decomposition in Alaskan tundra. Ecological Monographs, 66, 503-522.
43. Hobbie, S.E. (2008) Nitrogen effects on decomposition: a five-year experiment in eight temperate sites. Ecology, 89, 2633-2644.
44. Hooper, D.U., Chapin, F.S., Ewel, J.J., Hector, A., Inchausti, P. & Lavorel, S. (2005) Effects of biodiversity on ecosystem functioning: a consensus of current knowledge. Ecological Monographs, 75, 3-35.
45. Huston, M.A. (2004) Management strategies for plant invasions: manipulating productivity, disturbance, and competition. Diversity and distributions, 10, 167-178.
46. Knapp, A.K. & Smith, M.D. (2001) Variation among biomes in temporal dynamics of above-ground primary production. Science, 291, 481-484.
47. Lal, R. (2004) Soil carbon sequestration impacts on global climate change and food security. Science, 304, 1623-1627.
48. Lambin, E., Gibbs, H.K., Ferreira, L., Grau, R., Mayaux, P., Meyfroidt, P. et al. (2013) Estimating the world's potentially available cropland using a bottom-up approach. Global Environmental Change, 23, 892-901.
49. Lau, J., Ioannidis, J.P.A. & Schmid, C.H. (1998) Summing up evidence: one answer is not always enough. Lancet, 351, 123-127.
50. Lenoir, J., Gégout, J.C., Marquet, P.A., De Ruffay, P. & Brisse, H. (2008) A significant upward shift in plant species optimum elevation during the 20th century. Science, 320, 1768-1771.
51. Luo, Y., Sherry, R., Zhou, X. & Wan, S. (2009) Terrestrial carbon-cycle feedback to climate warming: experimental evidence on plant regulation and impacts of biofuel feedstock harvest. Global Change Biology Bioenergy, 1, 62-74.
52. MacDougall, A.S. (2005) Responses of diversity and invasibility to burning in a northern oak savanna. Ecology, 86, 3354-3363.
53. MacDougall, A.S., Bennett, J., Firn, J., Seabloom, E., Borer, E., Lind, E. et al. (2014) Anthropogenic-based regional-scale factors most consistently explain plot level exotic diversity in grasslands. Global Ecology and Biogeography, doi: 10.1111/geb.12157.
54. Mack, R.N. & Thompson, J.N. (1982) Evolution in steppe with few large, hoofed mammals. American Naturalist, 119, 757-773.
55. Matson, P.A., Parton, W.J., Power, A.G. & Swift, M.J. (1997) Agricultural intensification and ecosystem properties. Science, 277, 504-509.
56. McCulley, R.L., Burke, I.C., Nelson, J.A., Lauenroth, W.K., Knapp, A.K. & Kelly, E.F. (2005) Regional patterns in carbon cycling across the Great Plains of North America. Ecosystems, 8, 106-121.
57. Moher, D., Liberati, A., Tetzlaff, J. & Altman, D.G. (2009) Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: the PRISMA statement. Annals of Internal Medicine, 151, 264-269.
58. O'Connor, M.I., Selig, E.R., Pinsky, M.L. & Altermatt, F. (2012) Toward a conceptual synthesis for climate change responses. Global Ecology and Biogeography, 21, 693-703.
59. O'Halloran, L.R., Borer, E.T., Seabloom, E.W., MacDougall, A.S., Cleland, E.E., McCulley, R.L. et al. (2013) Regional contingencies in the relationship between above-ground Biomass and litter in the world's grasslands. PLoS ONE, 8, e54988.
60. 2 (eds J. Wisniewski & R.N. Sampson ), pp. 643-657. Springer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands.
61. Parmesan, C. (2006) Ecological and evolutionary responses to recent climate change. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics, 37, 637-669.
62. Parton, W.J., Scurlock, J.M.O., Ojima, D.S., Schimel, D.S. & Hall, D.O. (1995) Impact of climate change on grassland production and soil carbon worldwide. Global Change Biology, 1, 13-22.
63. Proulx, M. & Mazumder, A. (1998) Reversal of grazing impact on plant species richness in nutrient-poor vs. nutrient-rich ecosystems. Ecology, 79, 2581-2582.
64. Richardson, P., MacDougall, A.S., Stanley, A., Kaye, T. & Dunwiddie, P. (2012) Inversion of dominance-diversity relationships along a latitudinal stress gradient. Ecology, 93, 1431-1438.
65. Ricklefs, R.E. (2008) Disintegration of the ecological community. The American Naturalist, 172, 741-750.
66. Rockstrom, J., Steffen, W., Noone, K., Persson, A., Chapin, F.S., Lambin, E.F. et al. (2009) A safe operating space for humanity. Nature, 461, 472-475.
67. Rosenberg, M.S., Adams, D.C. & Gurevitch, J. (2000) MetaWin: Statistical Software for Meta-Analysis. Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, MA.
68. Rustad, L.E., Campbell, J.L., Marion, G., Norby, R., Mitchell, M., Hartley, A., Cornelissen, J.H.C. & Gurevitch, J. (2001) A meta-analysis of the response of soil respiration, net nitrogen mineralization, and above-ground plant growth to experimental ecosystem warming. Oecologia, 126, 543-562.
69. Sala, O.E., Parton, W.J., Joyce, L.A. & Lauenroth, W.K. (1988) Primary production of the central grassland region of the United States. Ecology, 69, 40-45.
70. Schierhorn, F., Müller, D., Beringer, T., Prishchepov, A.V., Kuemmerle, T. & Balmann, A. (2013) Post-Soviet cropland abandonment and carbon sequestration in European Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 27, 1175-1185.
71. Schlesinger, W.H. & Andrews, J.A. (2000) Soil respiration and the global carbon cycle. Biogeochemistry, 48, 7-20.
72. Seabloom, E.W., Ruggiero, P., Hacker, S.D., Mull, J. & Zarnetske, P. (2013) Invasive grasses, climate change, and exposure to storm-wave overtopping in coastal dune ecosystems. Global Change Biology, 19, 824-832.
73. 2. Science, 298, 1987-1990.
74. Stevens, C.J., Dise, N.B., Mountford, J.O. & Gowing, D.J. (2004) Impact of nitrogen deposition on the species richness of grasslands. Science, 303, 1876-1879.
75. Suttle, K.B., Thomsen, M.A. & Power, M.E. (2007) Species interactions reverse grassland responses to changing climate. Science, 315, 640-642.
76. Tilman, D., Reich, P.B. & Knops, J.M.H. (2006) Biodiversity and ecosystem stability in a decade-long grassland experiment. Nature, 441, 629-632.
77. Tilman, D., Fargione, J., Wolff, B., D'Antonio, C., Dobson, A., Howarth, R. et al. (2001) Forecasting agriculturally driven global environmental change. Science, 292, 281-284.
78. Tilman, D., Cassman, K.G., Matson, P.A., Naylor, R. & Polasky, S. (2002) Agricultural sustainability and intensive production practices. Nature, 418, 671-677.
79. Vila, M., Espinar, J.L., Hejda, M., Hulme, P.E., Jarosik, V., Maron, J.L., Pergl, J., Schaffner, U., Sun, Y. & Pysek, P. (2011) Ecological impacts of invasive alien plants: a meta-analysis of their effects on species, communities and ecosystems. Ecology Letters, 14, 702-708.
80. Vitousek, P.M. (1994) Beyond global warming: ecology and global change. Ecology, 75, 1861-1876.
81. Vitousek, P.M., Mooney, H.A., Lubchenco, J. & Melillo, J.M. (1997) Human domination of Earth's ecosystems. Science, 277, 494-499.
82. Weiher, E., Forbes, S., Schauwecker, T. & Grace, J.B. (2004) Multivariate control of plant species richness and community biomass in blackland prairie. Oikos, 106, 151-157.
83. 2 stabilization, climate change and the terrestrial carbon sink. Global Change Biology, 6, 817-833.
84. Williams, J.W., Seabloom, E.W., Slayback, D., Stoms, D.M. & Viers, J.H. (2005) Anthropogenic impacts upon plant species richness and net primary productivity in California. Ecology Letters, 8, 127-137.
85. Wright, C.K. & Wimberly, M.C. (2013) Recent land use change in the Western Corn Belt threatens grasslands and wetlands. Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B, Biological Sciences, 110, 4134-4139.
86. 2, and nitrogen deposition on grassland diversity. Proceedings of the National academy of Sciences, 100, 7650-7654.
87. Ziter, C. & MacDougall, A.S. (2013) Nutrients and defoliation increase soil carbon inputs in grassland. Ecology, 94, 106-116.