Authors: Kimberly O’Keefe Jesse B Nippert
Publish Date: 2016/09/10
Volume: 411, Issue: 1-2, Pages: 423-436
Abstract
Fire and grazing are important disturbances in grasslands yet we know little about how they impact a variety of plant physiological processes such as plant ecohydrology Here we assessed the impact of fire history and grazing by Bison bison on the source of water uptake and niche overlap in common grassland species at the Konza Prairie Biological Station a temperate mesic grassland located in northeastern Kansas USAWe used the stable isotopic signature of soil and xylem water to evaluate water uptake in Andropogon gerardii Vernonia baldwinii Amorpha canescens and Rhus glabra within varying grazing grazed ungrazed fire 012 or 3 years since last burn topography upland lowland and month July August contrasts over 3 years 2013–2015The presence of grazers not fire history altered water uptake patterns in these common grassland species Particularly grazing increased the proportion of shallow water utilized by A gerardii and R glabra reducing niche overlap with other cooccurring species However these responses varied intraannually and were often modulated by topographyWe would like to thank Braden Hoch Andy Muench Rachel Keen Ben Ketter Patrick O’Neal Lindsey Swartz Jeff Taylor and Josh Taylor for their help with sample collection and data processing We also thank Tony Joern for helpful comments on the manuscript Funding was provided for K O’Keefe by the Kansas State University NSF GK12 program Grant NSF DGE0841414 and a Prairie Biotic Research Small Grant Funding for both K O’Keefe and J Nippert was provided by the Konza Prairie LTER program NSF DEB1440484
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