LTREB: Multi-species Herbivore Exclusion Experiment in a Semi-arid Landscape in Laikipia, Kenya

LTREB：肯尼亚莱基皮亚半干旱地区的多物种草食动物排除实验

• 批准号: 9726642
• 负责人: Truman Young
• 金额: $ 24.99万
• 依托单位: University of California-Davis
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1998
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1998-07-15 至 2003-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9726642&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: LTREB; Multi; species; Herbivore; Exclusion

9726642 Young This project will support a long-term, large-scale factorial experiment on the effects of native and domestic herbivores on each other and on the land they share in East Africa. Eighteen 4-ha plots have already been established that exclude six replicated combinations of (1) cattle, (2) wild large mammals, and (3) mega-herbivores (elephants and giraffes). This is the first controlled exclusion experiment that factors out the separate and combined effects of livestock and large wild herbivores, providing a unique opportunity to answer a series of basic and applied questions about the ecology of semi-arid ecosystems. This research is being conducted at Mpala Research Centre in north central Kenya. It is home to a largely intact fauna that is characteristic of East African savanna woodlands, including elephants, two species of zebras, cape buffaloes, elands, gazelles, giraffes, hertebeests, oryxes, lions, leopards, cheetahs, and many other species of large and small mammals. This proposal will document compensatory responses of the vegetation and of non-excluded herbivores, underlying vegetation changes associated with exclusion, the mode and rate of encroachment by woody plants, and the maintenance of the nutrient-rich glades that appear to me major organizing features of this landscape mosaic. This research will elucidate several fundamental issues in ecology, including the maintenance of resource hot-spots by endogenous ecosystem processes in a landscape mosaic.

这个项目将支持一项长期的、大规模的因子试验，研究东非本地和家养食草动物对彼此的影响以及对它们共享的土地的影响。已经建立了18个4公顷的地块，排除了6种重复组合：(1)牛，(2)野生大型哺乳动物，(3)大型食草动物（大象和长颈鹿）。这是第一个排除牲畜和大型野生食草动物单独和联合影响的对照排除实验，为回答有关半干旱生态系统生态学的一系列基本和应用问题提供了独特的机会。这项研究是在肯尼亚中北部的Mpala研究中心进行的。它是东非热带稀树大草原特有的大部分完整动物的家园，包括大象、两种斑马、角水牛、陆羚、瞪羚、长颈鹿、羚羊、羚羊、狮子、豹子、猎豹和许多其他种类的大小哺乳动物。本提案将记录植被和未被排除的食草动物的补偿反应，与排除相关的潜在植被变化，木本植物入侵的模式和速度，以及对这一景观马赛克的主要组织特征——营养丰富的林中空地的维护。本研究将阐明生态学的几个基本问题，包括景观镶嵌中内源性生态系统过程对资源热点的维持。