Biological Invasions

, Volume 12, Issue 8, pp 2537–2548 | Cite as

Consistency in the habitat degree of invasion for three invasive plant species across Mediterranean islands

  • Laurence Affre
  • Carey M. Suehs
  • Stéphane Charpentier
  • Montserrat Vilà
  • Giuseppe Brundu
  • Philip Lambdon
  • Anna Traveset
  • Philip E. Hulme
Original Paper
First Online:
Received:
Accepted:

Abstract

Habitats are known to vary in their vulnerability to invasion by alien plants and different species often colonise distinct habitats. To assess the consistency in the degree of invasion of particular habitats, this study examined the frequency of occurrence and local abundance of three invasive plant taxa: Ailanthus altissima, Carpobrotus spp., and Oxalis pes-caprae across different habitat types on four representative Mediterranean islands. We conducted systematic field surveys recording the presence-absence and cover of these taxa on the islands of Mallorca, Corsica, Sardinia and Crete. Drawing on the results of 5,285 sample points, the frequency of occurrence of the three invaders tends to be higher than expected in urban, ruderal and roadside habitats. In contrast, scrub habitats rarely contain any of the three invaders, indicating that they may be more resistant to invasion. The degree of invasion, determined by the local abundance of an invasive plant in any one habitat, varies according to the identity of the invader and the island. However, based on average abundance, Oxalis pes-caprae exhibits the highest degree of invasion, and Carpobrotus spp. the least. There is no indication that any one of the four islands is more prone to either higher frequencies or abundances of the three invaders. These patterns suggest that anthropogenic changes in Mediterranean islands will increase the vulnerability of certain habitats to invasion and increase the distribution of these three invasive taxa at any of the four islands.

Keywords

Alien Exotic Habitat invasibility Risk assessment Species abundance Weeds 
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Notes

Acknowledgments

We thank S. Pacciardi, E. Vidal, F. Médail, I. Gimeno, M.C. De la Bandera, and E. Moragues for field assistance, and two anonymous reviewers for comments on an earlier version of the manuscript. This study is part of EPIDEMIE (Exotic Plant Invasions: Deleterious Effects on Mediterranean Island Ecosystems) a research project supported by the European Commission under the 5th Framework, contributing to the implementation of Key Action 2.2.1 (Ecosystem Vulnerability) within the Energy, Environment and Sustainable Development thematic programme (Contract no. EVK2-CT-2000-00074). Further details of the project and the data bank can be found at www.ceh.ac.uk/epidemie. This work is also supported by INVABIO (Ministère de l’Ecologie et du Développement Durable, subvention no. 01113), the National Park of Port-Cros (contract no. 97.029.83400), the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship to C.M.S. and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation projects MONTES and RIXFUTUR to M.V.

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009

Authors and Affiliations

  • Laurence Affre
    • 1
  • Carey M. Suehs
    • 1
  • Stéphane Charpentier
    • 1
  • Montserrat Vilà
    • 2
  • Giuseppe Brundu
    • 3
  • Philip Lambdon
    • 4
  • Anna Traveset
    • 5
  • Philip E. Hulme
    • 6
  1. 1.Institut Méditerranéen d’Ecologie et de Paléoécologie (IMEP, UMR CNRS-IRD 6116)Université Paul CézanneMarseille cedex 20France
  2. 2.Estación Biológica de Doñana (EBD-CSIC)SevillaSpain
  3. 3.Dipartimento di Botanica ed Ecologia vegetaleUniversità degli Studi di SassariSassariItaly
  4. 4.NERC Centre for Ecology and HydrologyBanchory, AberdeenshireUK
  5. 5.Institut Mediterrani d’Estudis Avançats (CSIC-UIB)Esporles, Balearic IslandsSpain
  6. 6.The Bio-Protection Research CentreLincoln UniversityCanterburyNew Zealand

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