CRB: Wildlife Effects on Tallgrass Prairie Restorations: Extension and Renewal

然而，生长在肥沃、水分充足的土壤上的Tallgras草原代表着北美“最濒危”的主要生态系统，这些地点中的大多数都被转变为集约化农业。因此，懂得如何退耕还草是至关重要的。在塔尔格拉斯草原的任何恢复项目中，一个主要部分将是了解大米和草食的作用，特别是小型哺乳动物的作用，因为恢复的塔尔格拉斯草原的大部分不会被大型本土有蹄类动物吃掉。该项目建议继续进行一项研究，以考察小哺乳动物对复制的芦荟修复的影响。此外，还要求通过一系列实验，利用威斯康星州西南部啮齿动物可进入的围栏中的豆类啮齿动物抑制所带来的新机遇，提供支持。这些实验使用恢复技术来检验动物觅食和植物竞争理论的基本预测。这项工作将有助于洞察植物和动物之间的相互作用，这些植物和动物只能通过实验方法获得，最好是在合成的集合中进行，而不是在不可替代的高草草原残留物中进行。

9815289HoweTallgrass prairie on fertile, well-watered soils represents North America's "most endangered" major ecosystem, with most of those sites being converted to intensive agricultural. Thus, it is critical to know how to restore agricultural land to tallgrass prairie. A major part of any restoration project in tallgrass prairie will be understanding the roles of granivory and herbivory, especially by small mammals since much of the restored tallgrass prairie will not by grazed by large native ungulates. This project proposes to continue a study that is examining the effects of small mammal alteration of replicated tallgrass restoration. In addition, support is requested to take advantage of new opportunity presented by rodent suppression of legumes in rodent-accessible exclosures in southwestern Wisconsin using a series of experiments. These experiments use restoration techniques to test fundamental predictions from theories of animal foraging and plant competition. This work will contribute insight into the interactions of plants and animals that can only be garnered from an experimental approach, preferably carried out in synthetic assemblages rather than irreplaceable tallgrass prairie remnants.