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Louisiana State University

Faculty Publications

2006

Disturbance

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Comparing The Direct And Community-Mediated Effects Of Disturbance On Plant Population Dynamics: Flooding, Herbivory And Mimulus Guttatus, Bret D. Elderd, Dan F. Doak May 2006

Comparing The Direct And Community-Mediated Effects Of Disturbance On Plant Population Dynamics: Flooding, Herbivory And Mimulus Guttatus, Bret D. Elderd, Dan F. Doak

Faculty Publications

Competition, trophic interactions and abiotic disturbances play important roles in governing plant population dynamics, yet few studies have addressed their relative contributions or interacting effects. We used Life Table Response Experiment (LTRE) analysis, coupled with stochastic analyses, to examine how a major abiotic disturbance, flooding, influences the fitness and population growth of a common riparian plant, Mimulus guttatus, and how this effect compares and interacts with that exerted by herbivory. We also extended LTRE analysis to include nested factors, which enabled us to examine differences across experimental sites. These spatial contributions to changes in population growth rate, λ, were compared …


Disturbance-Mediated Trophic Interactions And Plant Performance, Bret D. Elderd Mar 2006

Disturbance-Mediated Trophic Interactions And Plant Performance, Bret D. Elderd

Faculty Publications

Disturbances, such as flooding, play important roles in determining community structure. Most studies of disturbances focus on the direct effects and, hence, the indirect effects of disturbances are poorly understood. Within terrestrial riparian areas, annual flooding leads to differences in the arthropod community as compared to non-flooded areas. In turn, these differences are likely to alter the survival, growth, and reproduction of plant species via an indirect effect of flooding (i.e., changes in herbivory patterns). To test for such effects, an experiment was conducted wherein arthropod predators and herbivores were excluded from plots in flooded and non-flooded areas and the …