Search results for "LAND"
showing 10 items of 9939 documents
Influence of the conservation status on carbon balances of semiarid coastal Mediterranean wetlands
2020
Permanent freshwater and brackish marshes are the typical wetland type of the Mediterranean Spanish coast. Historically, alterations to the original morphological and hydrological characteristics o...
Effects of nutrient addition, recovery thereafter and the role of macrophytes in nutrient dynamics of a Mediterranean shallow lake: a mesocosm experi…
2017
Eutrophication in coastal wetlands has increased greatly because of human impact, reducing water quality and affecting aquatic plants. The aim of the present study was to investigate the eutrophication of Mediterranean wetlands and their possible recovery. An in situ mesocosm nutrient enrichment experiment was performed in a coastal shallow lake from eastern Spain, holding dense Chara meadows. In this lake, 36 mesocosms were installed and fertilised weekly with four levels of N and P addition over an 8-week period from June to August. Mesocosms fertilised with the two higher levels (N:P ≥5:0.5mgL–1) shifted to turbid status with macrophyte loss before Week 4. Saturation concentrations were…
Criteria to identify old-growth forests in the Mediterranean: A case study from Sicily based on a literature review and some management proposals
2018
Old growth forests are increasingly considered and studied all around the world. However, the knowledge of such important forest systems is still limited in some bioclimatic regions, such as in the Mediterranean Basin. Starting from the knowledge acquired elsewhere, our research was carried out with the aim to select the most effective criteria to identify potential old-growth forests in Mediterranean ecosystems (Sicily, Italy). Four key proxy indicators were considered: deadwood amount, tree size, structural traits, and tree species richness. A preliminary classification of the local forest stands level in three classes of old-growthness (high, medium and low) has also been proposed. The m…
Mediterranean rocky reefs in the Anthropocene: Present status and future concerns
2021
Abstract Global change is striking harder and faster in the Mediterranean Sea than elsewhere, where high levels of human pressure and proneness to climate change interact in modifying the structure and disrupting regulative mechanisms of marine ecosystems. Rocky reefs are particularly exposed to such environmental changes with ongoing trends of degradation being impressive. Due to the variety of habitat types and associated marine biodiversity, rocky reefs are critical for the functioning of marine ecosystems, and their decline could profoundly affect the provision of essential goods and services which human populations in coastal areas rely upon. Here, we provide an up-to-date overview of …
Cetacean strandings and museum collections: A focus on Sicily island crossroads for mediterranean species
2021
The study examined the extent of the cetacean strandings in Italy, with a particular focus on Sicily Island. The paper aimed to contribute to the description of a pattern that contemplates the “regular and rare” cetacean species passage along the Sicilian coast. The estimate of marine cetacean strandings was extrapolated from the National Strandings Data Bank (BDS—Banca Dati Spiaggiamenti) and evaluated according to a subdivision in three coastal subregions: the Tyrrhenian sub-basin (northern Sicilian coast), the Ionian sub-basin (eastern Sicilian coast), and the Channel of Sicily (southern Sicilian coast). Along the Italian coast, more than 4880 stranding events have been counted in the pe…
Plastid DNA Homogeneity in Celtis australis L. (Cannabaceae) and Nerium oleander L. (Apocynaceae) throughout the Mediterranean Basin
2015
International audience; Premise of research. Riparian plants are highly dependent on water sources; consequently, general climatic conditions are less important to these taxa relative to woodland and shrubland species. This leads to interesting research questions regarding riparian plant taxa. Research on phylogeography of Mediterranean riparian tree and shrub species is scarce. In this article, we investigated the plastidial genetic diversity in Celtis australis L. (hackberry) and Nerium oleander L. (oleander) throughout the Mediterranean Basin. Both species are distributed in gullies, rivers, and stream banks under warm temperate climates. Methodology. Eighteen cpSSR loci and three noncod…
Distribution, ecological role and symbioses of selected shrubby species in the Mediterranean Basin: a review
2020
Among the Mediterranean ecosystems, shrublands are a characteristic type of vegetation, widespread in different habitats. Owing to different factors such as the physiological, morphological, reproductive, phenological and regenerative properties, as well as the inter-intraspecific interactions, each shrubby species represents an important element within the plant community and plays a specific ecological role. In this review, attention was focused on the ecological functions and type of plant-microsymbiont interactions in respect of selected shrubby species within the Mediterranean Basin: Amelanchier ovalis, Astragalus nebrodensis, Crataegus laciniata, Lycium intricatum, Prunus spinosa and …
Differential endozoochory of aquatic invertebrates by two duck species in shallow lakes
2017
Abstract Animal vectors are essential for the movement of invertebrate resting eggs between water bodies. However, differences in habitat preferences and feeding behaviour between bird species may result in variations in the dispersal of invertebrates via these birds, even if the different bird species live in the same lake. To test such effects, faecal samples from Anas platyrhynchos (collected in autumn and spring) and Tadorna tadorna (collected in spring) were cultured in water at 20° C and 12 L: 12 D conditions in order to quantify the resting eggs which could be internally transported by these birds. One half of each faecal sample was initially cultured at a conductivity of 0.6 mS cm −…
Community size affects the signals of ecological drift and niche selection on biodiversity
2019
AbstractEcological drift can override the effects of deterministic niche selection on small populations and drive the assembly of small communities. We tested the hypothesis that smaller local communities are more dissimilar among each other because of ecological drift than larger communities, which are mainly structured by niche selection. We used a unique, comprehensive dataset on insect communities sampled identically in a total of 200 streams in climatically different regions (Brazil and Finland) that differ in community size by fivefold. Null models allowed us to estimate the magnitude to which beta diversity deviates from the expectation under a random assembly process while taking di…
The role of watercourse versus overland dispersal and niche effects on ostracod distribution in Mediterranean streams (eastern Iberian Peninsula)
2016
Abstract The processes behind the heterogeneous distribution of species involve a combination of environmental and spatial effects. In the spatial context, stream networks constitute appropriate systems to compare the relative importance of two dispersal modes in aquatic organisms: overland and watercourse dispersal. In the present study, we analyzed the distribution of ostracod species in a river network in the eastern Iberian Peninsula, with variation partitioning between environmental and spatial factors, using Moran and Asymmetric Eigenvector Maps (MEMs, AEMs) as spatial variables. Our aims were to determine the relative importance of environmental and spatial control and to compare the…