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Spatio-temporal patterns along a primary succession on alluvial sediments

  • Research Article
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Central European Journal of Biology

Abstract

Dynamic alluvial landscapes offer many possibilities to study primary succession processes on newly developed habitats. However, within the Central European environmental conditions, where watercourses and their riparian spaces are under severe anthropogenic pressures — water regulation, deforestation, lowering of groundwater — natural processes are limited. We studied primary succession on alluvial stream deposits in an artificial lake, where we aimed to follow the terrestrialisation rate and habitat turnover, along with plant species richness and composition across successional stages. In 30 years, a pristine white-willow riparian forest developed. One half of the initially aquatic habitat became terrestrial. The frequency of change, studied on 11250 quadrats 10×10 m each (on a scale from “no change” to 8 changes) and the mean of change per habitat type (most of the habitats changed 2 to 3 times) revealed only one successional trajectory. The percentage flow chart showed a deterministic pathway of succession. The “time since formation” of a terrestrial habitat shows that more than 20% of the lake was terrestrialised within in the first ten years. We studied species richness and composition along three composed transects, following successional stages. We found that the newly assembled riparian white willow woodland has a surprisingly low colonisation rate of plant species.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Ecological Engineering, SI-2000, Maribor, Slovenia

    Maša Ignjatović

  2. Department of Biology, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, University of Maribor, SI-2000, Maribor, Slovenia

    Mitja Kaligarič, Sonja Škornik & Danijel Ivajnšič

Authors
  1. Maša Ignjatović
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  2. Mitja Kaligarič
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  3. Sonja Škornik
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  4. Danijel Ivajnšič
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Correspondence to Sonja Škornik.

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Ignjatović, M., Kaligarič, M., Škornik, S. et al. Spatio-temporal patterns along a primary succession on alluvial sediments. cent.eur.j.biol. 8, 888–897 (2013). https://doi.org/10.2478/s11535-013-0205-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/s11535-013-0205-x

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