Competition between a Lawn-Forming Cynodon dactylon and a Tufted Grass Species Hyparrhenia hirta on a South-African Dystrophic Savanna

South African savanna grasslands are often characterised by indigestible tufted grass species whereas lawn grasses are far more desirable in terms of herbivore sustenance. We aimed to investigate the role of nutrients and/or the disturbance (grazing, trampling) by herbivores on the formation of graz...

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Vydáno v:	PloS one Ročník 10; číslo 10; s. e0140789
Hlavní autoři:	Zwerts, J. A., Prins, H. H. T., Bomhoff, D., Verhagen, I., Swart, J. M., de Boer, W. F.
Médium:	Journal Article
Jazyk:	angličtina
Vydáno:	United States Public Library of Science 28.10.2015 Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Témata:	Animal feeding behavior Animals Behavior Biomass Clipping Competition Cynodon - physiology Cynodon dactylon Disturbance Ecology Ecosystem Environmental aspects Feeding Behavior - physiology Forming Grasses Grassland Grasslands Grazing Growth Herbivores Herbivory - physiology Hyparrhenia hirta Interspecific Leerstoelgroep Resource Ecology Morphology Nitrogen Nutrient concentrations Nutrients Nutrients in soil Observations PE&RC Phosphorus Poaceae - physiology Regeneration Resource Ecology Rhizomes Savannahs Savannas Soil nutrients Species Trampling South Africa Netherlands
ISSN:	1932-6203, 1932-6203
On-line přístup:	Získat plný text
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Shrnutí:	South African savanna grasslands are often characterised by indigestible tufted grass species whereas lawn grasses are far more desirable in terms of herbivore sustenance. We aimed to investigate the role of nutrients and/or the disturbance (grazing, trampling) by herbivores on the formation of grazing lawns. We conducted a series of common garden experiments to test the effect of nutrients on interspecific competition between a typical lawn-forming grass species (Cynodon dactylon) and a species that is frequently found outside grazing lawns (Hyparrhenia hirta), and tested for the effect of herbivore disturbance in the form of trampling and clipping. We also performed a vegetation and herbivore survey to apply experimentally derived insights to field observations. Our results showed that interspecific competition was not affected by soil nutrient concentrations. C. dactylon did show much more resilience to disturbance than H. hirta, presumably due to the regenerative capacity of its rhizomes. Results from the field survey were in line with these findings, describing a correlation between herbivore pressure and C. dactylon abundance. We conclude that herbivore disturbance, and not soil nutrients, provide C. dactylon with a competitive advantage over H. hirta, due to vegetative regeneration from its rhizomes. This provides evidence for the importance of concentrated, high herbivore densities for the creation and maintenance of grazing lawns.
Bibliografie:	ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 14 content type line 23 Conceived and designed the experiments: HP JS WdB JZ DB. Performed the experiments: JZ DB IV. Analyzed the data: JZ DB IV WdB. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: JZ HP DB IV JS WdB. Wrote the paper: JZ HP DB IV JS WdB. Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
ISSN:	1932-6203 1932-6203
DOI:	10.1371/journal.pone.0140789