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Fire differentially affects mortality and seedling regeneration of three woody invaders in forest–grassland mosaics of the southern Western Ghats, India

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Abstract

Invasion by exotic woody species is a major concern in grasslands worldwide. Woody invasions pose a particularly serious threat to forest–grassland mosaics globally, but the factors influencing the success of woody species in these systems, including the role of disturbances such as fire, are not well understood. In this study, we evaluated the role of fire in influencing mortality and regeneration success of three globally widespread woody invasives, Acacia mearnsii (black wattle), Cytisus scoparius (scotch broom) and Ulex europaeus (gorse) in the montane forest–grassland mosaics of the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve in the Western Ghats biodiversity hotspot, India. Our results indicate that mortality and regeneration responses to fire are species-specific. Fire-induced adult mortality was highest in scotch broom and lowest in gorse, and high, but variable in wattle. Burning greatly increased the abundance of gorse and wattle seedlings, but only marginally increased scotch broom seedling abundance. Fire effects on invasive seedling densities were most pronounced at the edges of invasive patches. Overall, our results indicate that fires are likely to differentially affect invasion patterns of these three species, with fire potentially encouraging invasion by gorse and wattle and discouraging invasion by scotch broom.

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by grants from Sir Dorabji Tata Trust, Department of Science and Technology, Foundation for Ecological Research, Advocacy and Learning, and the National Centre for Biological Sciences, India. We would also like to thank the Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India for support through funds from the Changing Water Cycle programme (Grant Ref: MoES/NERC/16/02/10 PC-II) and the Hydrological footprint of Invasive Alien Species project (MOES/PAMC/H&C/85/2016-PC-II). The authors of this study would also like to thank Dr. Jayashree Ratnam, Dr. Atul Joshi, Dr. Ankila Hiremath and Manaswi Raghurama for help in ideation and drafting the manuscript. Constant support from Selva Kumar, Kamal Raj, Susilan and Kumaran from the field team also deserves due credit. We are also very grateful to the two anonymous reviewers who have provided many useful comments on the manuscript.

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  1. Post-Graduate Program in Wildlife Biology and Conservation, Wildlife Conservation Society – India Program, National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore, India

    Rasikapriyaa Thanalapadi Sriramamurthy

  2. Foundation for Ecological Research, Advocacy and Learning (FERAL), Pondicherry, India

    Ravinder Singh Bhalla

  3. National Centre for Biological Sciences, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Bangalore, India

    Mahesh Sankaran

  4. School of Biology, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

    Mahesh Sankaran

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Sriramamurthy, R.T., Bhalla, R.S. & Sankaran, M. Fire differentially affects mortality and seedling regeneration of three woody invaders in forest–grassland mosaics of the southern Western Ghats, India. Biol Invasions 22, 1623–1634 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-020-02207-7

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