CRB: Biodiversity in Experimental Prairie Restorations

然而，我建议发现，当农业用地转变为原生高草植被时，以种子为食的鸟类、啮齿动物和以叶为食的哺乳动物是否会影响植物多样性和群落组成。鸟类和哺乳动物根据大小选择种子，大多数食草哺乳动物根据大小选择种子，大多数食草哺乳动物更喜欢吃某些植物的叶子而不是其他植物。然而，目前尚不清楚实验室中明显的偏好是否真的改变了高草草原群落的组成和多样性，无论是在保存的残余物中还是在恢复后形成的合成组合中。了解种子库枯竭和哺乳食草动物集约化等基本过程，将有助于土地复垦、草原恢复和保护数百种本地物种，这些物种现在占据着外围的旧田野或林地栖息地，或者在适合集约化农业的肥沃土壤上日益孤立的草原遗迹（现在占前欧洲地区面积的1%）。在威斯康辛州西南部进行的一项封闭实验将确定脊椎动物的消费者选择是否会在草原草和牧草的复制恢复过程中调节植物成分。我将在准备了两年的农休用地上播种45种有代表性的植物。不同水平的脊椎动物通道（无通道、鸟类通道、啮齿动物通道、包括鹿在内的总通道）应在最初获得相同数量和组成的种子的复制样地中产生不同的物种组成。蟋蟀和小啮齿动物应该抑制大种子物种(（3.0 mg/粒），麻雀应该抑制中等大小种子物种（0.3-2.0 mg/粒），而种子小到脊椎动物感兴趣的植物种群(（0.2 mg/粒）应该是最多样化和最丰富的，当颗粒动物存在时。由于所有脊椎动物都不存在，大种子物种应该不成比例地丰富。啮齿动物和鹿在出现后进入应该有利于草，因为它们对牧草有选择性。值得注意的是，在种子选择和草食动物的觅食生态学中被认为是公理的觅食偏好通常未经在高草草原群落中测试，因此不能用于保护或恢复丰富的植物区系。最近的经验表明，当修复作为一门科学来进行时，它是非常具有启发性的。这项研究将增加联邦、州和地方政府、私人利益集团和环境组织所需要的科学理解，这些组织越来越多地致力于“从零开始恢复”在肥沃的农业土壤上日益稀少的物种组合。

Howe I propose to discover whether seed-eating birds and rodents and foliage-eating mammals influence plant diversity and community composition as agricultural land is converted to native tallgrass vegetation. Birds and mammals select seeds by size, and most herbivorous mammals select seeds by size, and most herbivorous mammals prefer to eat foliage of some plant species over others. However it is not known whether preferences evident in the lab actually alter composition and diversity of tallgrass prairie communities, either in conserved remnants or in synthetic assemblages created by restoration. Understanding such basic processes as seedbank depletion and intensive mammalian herbivore will aid in land reclamation, prairie restoration, and conservation of hundreds of native species which now occupy peripheral oldfield or woodland habitats, or increasingly isolated prairie remnants now (( 1% of pre-European extent on rich soils suitable for intensive agriculture. An exclosure experiment in southwestern Wisconsin will determine whether consumer choices by vertebrates regulate vegetative composition during establishment of replicated restorations of prairie grass and forbs. I will seed 45 representative species of fallow agricultural land that has been prepared for two years. Different levels of vertebrate access (no access, bird access, rodent access, total access including deer) should produce different species composition in replicated plots that initially receive the same number an composition of seeds. Cricetid and microtine rodents should depress large-seeded species (( 3.0 mg/seed), sparrows should depress species with seeds of intermediate size (0.3-2.0 mg/seed), while populations of plants with seeds to small to be of interest to vertebrates (( 0.2 mg/seed) should be most diverse and abundant when granviores are present. With all vertebrates absent, large-seeded species should be disproportionately abundant. Rodent and deer access after emergence should favor grasses because of selective herbivore on forbs. It is remarkable that foraging preferences considered axiomatic in foraging ecology of seed selection and herbivore are generally untested in tallgrass prairie communities, and therefore cannot be applied to conserving or restoring a rich flora. Recent experience has shown that when restoration is done as a science, it is very revealing. This study will augment scientific understanding needed by federal, state, and local governments, private interests, and environmental groups that show an increasing commitment to "restoration from scratch" of species assemblages that are vanishingly rare on rich agricultural soils.