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Riparian Vegetation In The Face Of Environmental Variability, Kelly A. Steinberg

Biology ETDs

Riparian ecosystems are among the most highly disturbed ecosystems globally, over the past century dryland riparian forests have become less likely to flood, removing the largest historical disturbance. Yet these provide many essential ecosystem services. Climate change adds further change and uncertainty to the future of these ecosystems. In the southwestern United States, climate models predict changes in the mean and variance of temperature and precipitation. Determining the ecological consequences of interactions between slow changes in long-term climate means and amplified variability in climate is an important research frontier in plant ecology. We used long-term plant cover, groundwater and precipitation …