The effect of nutrient enriched sediment deposits on the vegetational traits of a patch-grazed semi-arid grassland

✍ Scribed by Fuls, E. R.

• Publisher: Springer-Verlag
• Year: 1991
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 421 KB
• Volume: 96
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1573-5052
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00044978

✦ Synopsis

Permanent grazing exclosures were established in semi-arid grasslands to study long-term successional trends of vegetation in patches representing varying stages of vegetation retrogression. After an exceptionally heavy thunder-shower one research plot was flooded with run-off water from cultivated lands nearby, resulting in the deposition of nutrient enriched sediment in the research plot. The subsequent vegetational trends are compared to vegetational trends of similar patches in a control plot, in the same grazing camp, which was not flooded.

Successional trends were accelerated in the sediment covered micro-plots due to the improvement of habitat conditions. Substantial basal cover increases, ranging from 30~ to 124,5~o, were recorded in flooded micro-plots. By comparison basal cover increases in the control plot varied from 1 ~o to 45 ~o. In both cases the basal cover changes were predominantly the result of basal cover increases of large, tufted, perennial grass species. Patches representing severe vegetation retrogression in the sediment covered research plot, in contrast to degraded patches in the control plot, showed the most significant increases in basal cover of large, tufted, perennial grass species. It is concluded that degraded grassland could be restored effectively through habitat improvements.