The separation of fluctuation and long-term change in vegetation dynamics of a rising seashore

✍ Scribed by Cramer, Wolfgang ;Hytteborn, H�kan

• Publisher: Springer-Verlag
• Year: 1987
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 869 KB
• Volume: 69
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1573-5052
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00038697

✦ Synopsis

Field layer vegetation in four transects across a rising seashore of the island Skabbholmen (59°47'N, 19°12'E) in the Stockholm archipelago, eastern central Sweden, was sampled at the beginning and end of a six-year period. The data were analyzed by canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) with two external predictor variables, year of sampling and elevation (a proxy for the longer-term trend of change). During the sampling period, the vegetation changed in the direction of the longer-term trend at a rate consistent with the known rate of land uplift. However, a major part of the observed change was in a different direction, reflecting a shorter-term response to disturbance. The analysis effectively separated different types of floristic dynamics related to processes with different time-scales. A comparison with (unconstrained) correspondence analysis (DCA) illustrated the interpretive advantages of multivariate direct gradient analysis over conventional floristic ordination. * Vascular plant nomenclature follows Tutin et al., Flora Europaea, except for Deschampsia cespitosa (L.) Beauv. spp. bottnica (Wahlenb.) G. C. S. Clarke, which is named D. bottnica (Wahlenb.) Trin. ** We thank Cajo Ter Braak, Colin Prentice and Eddy Van der Maarel for discussions and comments on the manuscript. Hans Olofsson kindly provided assistance in the use of the faculty's computing facilities. Folke Hellstr6m prepared the figures.