TY - JOUR

T1 - Climate – grazing interactions in Mongolian rangelands

T2 - Effects of grazing change along a large-scale environmental gradient

AU - Ahlborn, Julian

AU - von Wehrden, Henrik

AU - Lang, Birgit

AU - Römermann, Christine

AU - Oyunbileg, Munkhzul

AU - Oyuntsetseg, Batlai

AU - Wesche, Karsten

PY - 2020/2/1

Y1 - 2020/2/1

N2 - There are still major gaps in our understanding of rangeland degradation. Assessing the interactions between climate and grazing effects could help to explain what unifies and separates rangelands, and may therefore promote a more sustainable management of livestock. We studied 15 local land-use transects along a 600 km long climatic gradient in Central Asia to test the hypothesis that grazing effects differ between relatively moist equilibrium (EQ) and dry non-equilibrium (NEQ) rangeland systems. We analysed plant community composition, species diversity and indicator species for different grazing intensities. We found pronounced differences in community composition along our climate gradient, revealed climate-related grazing effects on richness, responses of Simpson's diversity, and also found different grazing indicator species along the larger transect. We conclude that in NEQ rangelands, grazing effects are limited to sacrifice zones and environmental filtering dominates vegetation composition. With increasing precipitation, resource availability gains in importance leading to more complex communities dominated by grazing-tolerant species under EQ dynamics. Hints for xerophytization in the transition zone between EQ and NEQ highlight the vulnerability of rangelands that temporally shift from one state to the other. This calls for extra care in the management of livestock numbers in these transition areas.

AB - There are still major gaps in our understanding of rangeland degradation. Assessing the interactions between climate and grazing effects could help to explain what unifies and separates rangelands, and may therefore promote a more sustainable management of livestock. We studied 15 local land-use transects along a 600 km long climatic gradient in Central Asia to test the hypothesis that grazing effects differ between relatively moist equilibrium (EQ) and dry non-equilibrium (NEQ) rangeland systems. We analysed plant community composition, species diversity and indicator species for different grazing intensities. We found pronounced differences in community composition along our climate gradient, revealed climate-related grazing effects on richness, responses of Simpson's diversity, and also found different grazing indicator species along the larger transect. We conclude that in NEQ rangelands, grazing effects are limited to sacrifice zones and environmental filtering dominates vegetation composition. With increasing precipitation, resource availability gains in importance leading to more complex communities dominated by grazing-tolerant species under EQ dynamics. Hints for xerophytization in the transition zone between EQ and NEQ highlight the vulnerability of rangelands that temporally shift from one state to the other. This calls for extra care in the management of livestock numbers in these transition areas.

KW - DCA

KW - Gradients

KW - Grazing

KW - Indicator species analysis

KW - Non-equilibrium rangelands

KW - Species diversity

KW - Xerophytization

KW - Didactics of sciences education

KW - Environmental planning

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85074485404&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.jaridenv.2019.104043

DO - 10.1016/j.jaridenv.2019.104043

M3 - Journal articles

AN - SCOPUS:85074485404

VL - 173

JO - Journal of Arid Environments

JF - Journal of Arid Environments

SN - 0140-1963

M1 - 104043

ER -