Fire, Grazing, and Climatic Interactions in Tallgrass Prairie

一项关于火、放牧和火-牧相互作用对人口、社区和生态系统属性的多学科研究将在堪萨斯州东北部的原生高草草原地点Konza Prairie继续进行。这项拟议的研究建立并扩展了一项为期十年的关于火灾频率对塔尔格拉斯草原影响的研究。之前和拟议的LTER努力将继续提供长期数据和基线研究，例如那些产生了一系列密集的短期实验和操纵的研究，这些实验和操纵得到了NSF、NASA、USGS和国家基金的支持。这些先前研究的结果已被纳入目前的LTER测量和问题中。拟议研究的目标是了解放牧如何影响生物和生态系统的过程和模式，这些过程和模式是由景观镶嵌上的火灾频率强加的，所有这些都受到可变(可能是方向性的)气候制度的影响。一项新的、将地表水和地下水化学联系在一起的景观水平研究将与正在进行的测量相结合，为生态研究提供景观重点。新的重点涉及影响生态现象的地貌效应和景观相互作用；具体地说，从单个生物体的角度到流域一级，地貌格局与生态限制(火和/或放牧)之间的关系。如果生态学家要将他们的研究整合到生物过程可能与气候模型充分结合的规模，这些努力是必要的。Konza Prairie LTER研究小组在大气-生物圈相互作用领域做出了重要贡献，对这项研究的机构支持是突出的。

A multidisciplinary study of fire, grazing and fire-grazing interactions on population, community and ecosystem properties will be continued on Konza Prairie, a native tallgrass prairie site in northeastern Kansas. The proposed research builds and expands upon a ten-year study of fire frequency effects on tallgrass prairie. Previous and proposed LTER efforts will continue to provide long-term data and baseline studies such as those that spawned a series of intensive short-term experiments and manipulations supported by NSF, NASA, USGS and state funds. Results from these previous studies have been incorporated into current LTER measurements and questions. The goal of the proposed research is to understand how grazing influences biotic and ecosystem processes and patterns imposed by fire frequency over the landscape mosaic, all of which are subjected to a variable (and possibly directional) climate regime. A new, landscape-level study linking surface and ground water chemistry will interface with ongoing measurements to provide a landscape emphasis to ecological research. The new focus involves topotedaphic effects and landscape interactions influencing ecological phenomena; specifically, the relationship between geomorphic patterns and ecological constraints (fire and/or grazing) from the perspective of the individual organism to the watershed level. These efforts are necessary if ecologists are to integrate their research to scales where biotic processes may adequately be incorporated with climate models. The Konza Prairie LTER research team has made important contributions on the area of atmosphere-biosphere interactions, Institutional support for this research is outstanding.