Five-year carry-over effects in dune slack vegetation response to hydrology

Lisanne van Willegen; Hilary Wallace; Angela Curreli; Ciara Dwyer; John Ratcliffe; Davey L. Jones; Graham Williams; Martin Hollingham; Laurence Jones

doi:10.1016/j.ecolind.2024.113016

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Five-year carry-over effects in dune slack vegetation response to hydrology

Journal article

Open access

Peer reviewed

Five-year carry-over effects in dune slack vegetation response to hydrology

Lisanne van Willegen, Hilary Wallace, Angela Curreli, Ciara Dwyer, John Ratcliffe, Davey L. Jones, Graham Williams, Martin Hollingham and Laurence Jones

Ecological indicators, Vol.170, 113016

2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2024.113016

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Abstract

Ecohydrological guidelines

Ellenberg

Indicators

mean spring water Level (MSL)

Plant community

Time lag

Wetland

Dune slacks are biodiverse seasonal wetlands within sand dune systems, strongly influenced by the dynamics of the local groundwater regime. Future climate predictions indicate strong adverse impact on the hydrology and therefore ecology of these wetland ecosystems. In this study we aimed to find the most appropriate hydrological and ecological indicators to summarise dune slack plant community responses to hydrology over multiple years. We evaluated 80 hydrological metrics (weighted and un-weighted median, mean, minimum, maximum, mean spring level, averaged over 1–8 year duration, and 5 additional 1-year metrics) against plant community responses (variants of Ellenberg EbF moisture indicator). The data were drawn from 453 relevées in 17 dune slacks, using permanent quadrats and co-located piezometers, set up in 2010 with vegetation monitoring repeated six times until 2019. Within our study we found a strong relationship between multiple hydrology metrics and the plant community response, but this displayed inter-annual variation with different patterns and correlations between years. The best performing hydrology metric was the unweighted 5-year average mean spring water level (MSL), linked to unweighted mean EbF using vascular plant species only. Maximum water level (MAX) also performed well, but MSL was preferred as MAX can be enhanced or truncated by topography leading to anomalies for individual slacks. MSL is also flexible to implement within manual monitoring programmes, which could be targeted to 3-months per year over the spring as a minimum requirement. These findings provide simpler metrics for site managers to monitor potential hydrology and vegetation responses to climate change.

Details

Title: Five-year carry-over effects in dune slack vegetation response to hydrology
Authors/Creators: Lisanne van Willegen - Bangor University
Hilary Wallace - Canon (Japan)
Angela Curreli - Bangor University
Ciara Dwyer - Lund University
John Ratcliffe - Natural Resources Wales
Davey L. Jones - Bangor University
Graham Williams - Natural Resources Wales
Martin Hollingham - Bangor University
Laurence Jones - UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
Publication Details: Ecological indicators, Vol.170, 113016
Publisher: Elsevier Ltd.
Number of pages: 12
Identifiers: 991005726879607891
Murdoch Affiliation: Centre for Sustainable Farming Systems
Language: English
Resource Type: Journal article

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Source: InCites

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Collaboration types: Domestic collaboration; International collaboration
Citation topics: 3 Agriculture, Environment & Ecology; 3.40 Forestry; 3.40.86 Plant Communities
Web Of Science research areas: Biodiversity Conservation; Environmental Sciences
ESI research areas: Environment/Ecology