Stuck in the Matrix- Patch Matrix Dynamics in Florida Scrub
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Humans are fragmenting habitat and changing natural disturbance regimes at an unprecedented rate. Patch dynamics addresses how smaller patches of enclosed habitat interact with their surroundings, the matrix. Patches have been studied extensively in forested ecosystems where treefall or limb fall gaps are short-lived and stochastic, but patches also occur in grasslands and scrublands across the world. Although the relationship between patch characteristics such as size or degree of isolation have been studied, exactly how patch species interact with the surrounding habitat in non-forested systems is poorly understood. This study aims to specifically examine if and how plant species cover and plant species diversity in patches of Florida rosemary scrub are affected by the matrix spatial structure (i.e., bare sand cover) and the shrub cover in the surrounding shrub matrix. Despite a similarity in dominant shrubs and shrub species cover, I found that neither the shrub cover in the matrix nor matrix structure had any significant effect on the species cover or species diversity in the patches. However, a significant effect was found between matrix shrub cover and patch species cover when factoring in degree of isolation from other patches. This suggests that patches may interact more with each other than they do with the matrix when considering matrix spatial structure and composition. This could be a result of the high number of patch specialists in this system. Future studies of the scrub could investigate specific species interactions or spatial distributions of ecologically contrasting species. Future studies could also investigate whether species cover in rosemary scrub patches may follow island biogeography theory or some other metapopulation model less dependent on patch-matrix effects. Conservation of Florida rosemary scrub should emphasize reducing habitat loss for what may be already insular patches.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Publication date | May 4, 2023 |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Narasimhan, Sriram |
|---|---|
| Thesis advisor | Dirzo, Rodolfo |
| Thesis advisor | Fukami, Tadashi |
| Degree granting institution | Stanford University, Department of Biology |
Subjects
| Subject | Forest ecology |
|---|---|
| Subject | Ecology |
| Subject | Plant ecology |
| Subject | Biogeography |
| Subject | Florida |
| Subject | Scrub |
| Subject | Rare plants > Ecology |
| Subject | Rare plants > Geographical distribution |
| Subject | Rosemary Scrub |
| Genre | Text |
| Genre | Thesis |
Bibliographic information
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- Use and reproduction
- User agrees that, where applicable, content will not be used to identify or to otherwise infringe the privacy or confidentiality rights of individuals. Content distributed via the Stanford Digital Repository may be subject to additional license and use restrictions applied by the depositor.
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC).
Preferred citation
- Preferred citation
- Narasimhan, S. and Dirzo, R. (2023). Stuck in the Matrix- Patch Matrix Dynamics in Florida Scrub. Stanford Digital Repository. Available at https://purl.stanford.edu/jv839mm8287. https://doi.org/10.25740/jv839mm8287.
Collection
Undergraduate Theses, Department of Biology, 2022-2023
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- sriram3@stanford.edu
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