Search results for " species"
showing 10 items of 2593 documents
Living on the edge of a shrinking habitat: the ivory gull, Pagophila eburnea, an endangered sea-ice specialist.
2016
International audience; The ongoing decline of sea ice threatens many Arctic taxa, including the ivory gull. Understanding how ice-edges and ice concentrations influence the distribution of the endangered ivory gulls is a prerequisite to the implementation of adequate conservation strategies. From 2007 to 2013, we used satellite transmitters to monitor the movements of 104 ivory gulls originating from Canada, Greenland, Svalbard-Norway and Russia. Although half of the positions were within 41 km of the ice-edge (75% within 100 km), approximately 80% were on relatively highly concentrated sea ice. Ivory gulls used more concentrated sea ice in summer, when close to their high-Arctic breeding …
Genetic Diversity and Structure of Northern Populations of the Declining Coastal Plant Eryngium maritimum
2019
Abstract Genetic diversity among 13 northern populations of the declining coastal plant Eryngium maritimum L. at the northernmost extent of the species distribution range was studied using retro-transposon-based SSAP molecular markers. Diversity indices varied extensively among populations; some showing extremely low diversity whereas other populations exhibited moderate amounts of genetic variation. Differentiation among populations was highly variable as well. Interestingly, differentiation among northern populations was not influenced strongly by geographic distance. Closely situated populations were often more divergent than more distant populations suggesting other factors may be respo…
Reconstructing Bioinvasion Dynamics Through Micropaleontologic Analysis Highlights the Role of Temperature Change as a Driver of Alien Foraminifera I…
2021
Invasive alien species threaten biodiversity and ecosystem structure and functioning, but incomplete assessments of their origins and temporal trends impair our ability to understand the relative importance of different factors driving invasion success. Continuous time-series are needed to assess invasion dynamics, but such data are usually difficult to obtain, especially in the case of small-sized taxa that may remain undetected for several decades. In this study, we show how micropaleontologic analysis of sedimentary cores coupled with radiometric dating can be used to date the first arrival and to reconstruct temporal trends of foraminiferal species, focusing on the alien Amphistegina lo…
Tackling invasive alien species in Europe II: threats and opportunities until 2020
2017
2nd Freshwater Invasives - Networking for Strategy II (FINS-II) Conference -- JUL 11-14, 2016 -- Zagreb, CROATIA Skora, Michal Edward/0000-0002-9121-1318; Groom, Quentin/0000-0002-0596-5376; Lukas, Juliane/0000-0003-3336-847X; Skora, Michal/0000-0002-9121-1318; Piria, Marina/0000-0001-6324-9282; Smith, Emily/0000-0003-2767-9933; Simonovic, Predrag/0000-0002-4819-4962; Pastorino, Paolo/0000-0002-0585-1168; Koutsikos, Nicholas/0000-0003-0680-4504; Vilizzi, Lorenzo/0000-0001-8103-885X; Dobrzycka-Krahel, Aldona/0000-0002-4252-895X; Tarkan, Ali Serhan/0000-0001-8628-0514 WOS: 000412582000002 Invasive alien species (IAS) are a significant and growing problem worldwide. In Europe, some aspects of …
A Mediterranean Monk Seal Pup on the Apulia coast (Southern Italy): sign of an ongoing recolonisation?
2020
The Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus) is one of the most endangered marine mammals in the world. This species has been threatened since ancient times by human activities and currently amounts to approximately 700 individuals distributed in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea (Aegean and Ionian Sea) and Eastern Atlantic Ocean (Cabo Blanco and Madeira). In other areas, where the species is considered “probably extinct”, an increase in sporadic sightings has been recorded during recent years. Sightings and accidental catches of Mediterranean monk seals have become more frequent in the Adriatic Sea, mainly in Croatia but also along the coasts of Montenegro, Albania and Southern Italy. A Med…
Thirty years unmanaged green roofs: Ecological research and design implications
2016
Abstract The variations in species composition and assemblage of unmanaged simple-intensive green roofs in Hannover, Germany, were investigated over a thirty year period, in order to assess the persistence of the initial seed mixture and to evaluate floristic changes. The roofs were greened in 1985 with soil-based turf rolls sown with a mixture of five grasses (Festuca rubra, Festuca ovina, Agrostis capillaris, Lolium perenne and Poa pratensis). Three sets of 120 phytosociological releves, sampled in 1987, 1999 and 2014, have been compared to assess: (1) nestedness vs spatial turnover, (2) functional diversity and (3) the importance of vegetation dynamics on green roof performance and desig…
Quantitative Genetics of the Aging of Reproductive Traits in the Houbara Bustard
2015
International audience; Do all traits within an organism age for the same reason? Evolutionary theories of aging share a common assumption: the strength of natural selection declines with age. A corollary is that additive genetic variance should increase with age. However, not all senescent traits display such increases suggesting that other mechanisms may be at play. Using longitudinal data collected from more than 5400 houbara bustards (Chlamydotis undulata) with an exhaustive recorded pedigree, we investigated the genetics of aging in one female reproductive trait (egg production) and three male reproductive traits (courtship display rate, ejaculate size and sperm viability), that displa…
Invasion triple trouble : environmental fluctuations, fluctuation-adapted invaders and fluctuation-mal-adapted communities all govern invasion success
2017
AbstractIt has been suggested that climate change will lead to increased environmental fluctuations, which will undoubtedly have evolutionary consequences for all biota. For instance, fluctuations can directly increase the risk of invasions of alien species into new areas, as these species have repeatedly been proposed to benefit from disturbances. At the same time increased environmental fluctuations may also select for better invaders. However, selection by fluctuations may also influence the resistance of communities to invasions, which has rarely been tested. We tested eco-evolutionary dynamics of invasion with bacterial clones, evolved either in constant or fluctuating temperatures, an…
Seedling growth of a native ( Ampelodesmos mauritanicus ) and an exotic ( Pennisetum setaceum ) grass
2016
Scarce information is available on the biological reasons why a small subset of introduced species can effectively establish within novel ecosystems. A comparison of early growth traits can help to explain the better performance of alien invasive species versus native co-occurring species. In one year-long experiment, we compared the early life stages of Ampelodesmos mauritanicus (Poir.) Dur. & Schinz (Amp), a native perennial Mediterranean grass, and Pennisetum setaceum (Forssk.) Chiov (Penn), an emerging invader grass in sub-arid and Mediterranean-climate areas. The Penn seedlings grew significantly faster and were approximately 2.5 times taller than the Amp seedlings, reaching a fina…
Effects of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi on the Vegetative Vigor of Ailanthus altissima (Mill.) Swingle Seedlings under Sustained Pot Limitation
2018
In order to invade new ecosystems, invasive alien plants need to cope with different microbial communities. Whilst the ability to avoid antagonists is well recognized, the opportunity to establish mutualistic associations is less known, even in widespread invasive species such as Ailanthus altissima (Mill.) Swingle. We sought to evaluate whether the beneficial effects of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) on Ailanthus seedlings are maintained over time, under prolonged pot limitation. We compared three-month-, three-year- and four-year-old mycorrhizal seedlings grown in natural forest soil (NT) with seedlings grown in sterilized (ST) and non-mycorrhizal (NM) soils, in pots of 3.4 L (22 &tim…