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Contrasting Effects Of Cattle And Wildlife On The Vegetation Development Of A Savanna Landscape Mosaic, Kari E. Veblen

Kari E. Veblen

Through their effects on plant communities, herbivores can exert strong direct and indirect effects on savanna ecosystems and have the potential to create and maintain savanna landscape heterogeneity. Throughout much of sub‐Saharan Africa, periodic creation and abandonment of livestock corrals leads to landscape mosaics of long‐term ecosystem hotspots that attract both cattle and large ungulate wildlife. The development and maintenance of vegetation in these types of hotspots may be controlled in part by herbivory. Cattle and wildlife may have different, potentially contrasting effects on plant succession and plant–plant interactions. We ask how cattle and wild herbivores affect the maintenance and …