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Dune Building Dynamics Impact Cross-Island Connectivity And Barrier Island Characteristics, Alexander Sabo
Dune Building Dynamics Impact Cross-Island Connectivity And Barrier Island Characteristics, Alexander Sabo
Theses and Dissertations
Located at the land-sea interface, barrier islands are important protective features that reduce wave energy and erosion from mainland areas. Further, barrier islands provide habitat for many different organisms and serve as popular areas for recreation and tourism. As sandy landforms, barrier islands are easily disturbed, but often recover after disturbance as a result of island plant communities, specifically dune building grasses. Disturbance on barrier islands is driven by storms, tides, and overwash events. After disturbance has occurred, dune grasses colonize the dunes allowing for dune building and habitat restoration. On the Virginia barrier islands, there are three dominant dune …
Consequences Of Shrub Encroachment: Linking Changes In Canopy Structure To Shifts In The Resource Environment, Steven Brantley
Consequences Of Shrub Encroachment: Linking Changes In Canopy Structure To Shifts In The Resource Environment, Steven Brantley
Theses and Dissertations
Shrub expansion in herbaceous ecosystems is emerging as an important ecological response to global change, especially in mesic systems where increases in canopy biomass are greatest. Two consequences of woody encroachment are increases in belowground resources, such as carbon and nitrogen, and reductions in above-ground resources such as light, which affect diversity, community trajectory, and ecosystem function. My objective was to determine how expansion of the nitrogen-fixing shrub Morella cerifera affected the resource environment across a chronosequence of shrub expansion on a Virginia barrier island. I quantified changes in carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) cycling, canopy structure and understory light …
Avian Dispersal Of The Actinomycete Frankia Across A Barrier Island Landscape, Spencer Bissett
Avian Dispersal Of The Actinomycete Frankia Across A Barrier Island Landscape, Spencer Bissett
Theses and Dissertations
In the nutrient-poor soils characteristic of coastal environments, symbiotic association with the nitrogen-fixing root endosymbiont Frankia is essential to establishment and survival of the woody shrub Morella cerifera. Nutrient deficiency quickly becomes severe unless seedlings are infected by Frankia soon after germination. However, the means of arrival of Frankia prior to shrub establishment has not been determined. Using sterilized lab-grown M. cerifera seedlings and fecal samples collected from passerine birds on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, viability of avian dispersal of the bacteria was tested. Although passerine fecal samples did produce nodules on some sterilized M. cerifera seedlings, these experimental …