Reintroducing Vascular and Non-Vascular Plants to Disturbed Arctic Sites: Investigating Turfs and Turf Fragments

Ian G. Hnatowich; Eric G. Lamb; Katherine J. Stewart

doi:10.3368/er.41.1.3

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Figure 1.
Non-metric dimensional scaling (NMDS) ordination plots of treatment community composition two years after turf transplantation. Treatments are represented by circles (control), squares (Turf), triangles (Turfs + Shredded), and diamonds (Shredded). Ellipses represent the standard error of the weighted average of scores.
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Figure 2.
Non-metric Dimensional Scaling (NMDS) ordination plot of community composition of turfs over two years. Squares represent turfs from T treatments and the central turf from TS treatments. Years are represented by grey (2019) or black (2021) shading. Ellipses represent the standard error of the weighted average of scores.
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Figure 3.
Heatmaps of mean relative vascular and non-vascular cover expanding from the central plot of each treatment, grouped by distance from the central plot. Different letters within boxes represent significant differences between treatments and between distances, with mean and standard deviations presented below.
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Figure 4.
Heatmaps of vascular and non-vascular species expanding from the turfs that were observed in at least 10% of the T and TS treatment plots at either Quarry #1 or #2. Darker shades represent a greater relative contribution to the expanding communities. Bare ground, litter, vascular and non-vascular cover represent cover relative to all species, while deciduous shrubs, evergreen shrubs, graminoids, and forb growth forms represent cover relative to vascular cover, and lichen and moss growth forms represent cover relative to non-vascular cover. Different letters within the bare ground, litter, vascular, and non-vascular cover columns represent significant differences between distances.
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Garden Saxifragas. Source: Bailey, L.H. 1917. Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture (New York, NY: The MacMillan Company), The Florida Center for Instructional Technology, College of Education, University of South Florida, fcit.usf.edu.

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Table 1.

Means, standard deviations and significant difference indicators for all treatments, two years following transplantation, on species richness, and cover of bare ground features, total vegetation, litter, and growth forms. Different letters indicate significant differences between treatments for each variable determined through post-hoc comparisons of linear mixed effect models using block as a random factor.

Cover/Variable	Treatments
Cover/Variable	Turfs	Turfs + Shredded	Shredded	Control
Species Richness	20.2 ± 6.1 ^a	23.2 ± 7.1 ^a	10.4 ± 6.1 ^b	3.7 ± 3.2 ^c
Bare ground	289 ± 26.6 ^c	320 ± 52.2 ^bc	349 ± 68.6 ^ab	366 ± 18.8 ^a
Total Vegetation	195 ± 75.4 ^a	210 ± 91.8 ^a	56.5 ± 42.0 ^b	12.1 ± 13.4 ^c
Litter	74.9 ± 28.7 ^c	163 ± 33.4 ^b	210 ± 51.9 ^a	46.8 ± 29.1 ^d
Deciduous Shrubs	41.4 ± 22.4 ^a	39.6 ± 26.5 ^a	0 ± 0 ^b	0 ± 0 ^b
Evergreen Shrubs	37.8 ± 21.3 ^a	35.7 ± 26.4 ^a	0.6 ± 1.3 ^b	0.1 ± 0.3 ^b
Forbs	21.4 ± 17.4 ^a	24.4 ± 17.9 ^a	9.7 ± 13.2 ^b	4.4 ± 5.3 ^b
Graminoids	23.8 ± 18.1 ^a	20.0 ± 15.6 ^a	2.6 ± 3.3 ^b	3.3 ± 6.5 ^b
Biological Soil Crusts	0.3 ± 0.6 ^a	0.1 ± 0.3 ^a	0 ± 0 ^a	0.1 ± 0.2 ^a
Lichens	51.1 ± 38.4 ^ab	69.4 ± 37.9 ^a	33.6 ± 26.6 ^b	2.3 ± 3.6 ^c
Mosses	16.2 ± 13.6 ^a	18.2 ± 16.7 ^a	6.1 ± 7.6 ^b	0.9 ± 1.8 ^c

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Table 2.

Percent change of growth forms and species that represented at least 0.5% relative cover across both sites, either in 2019 or 2021, within the center plot of T and TS treatments. The percent difference of absolute cover is presented first, followed by relative cover in parenthesis. Absolute and relative cover are calculated as follows: absolute percent differences = ([species cover in 2021 – species cover in 2019] / species cover in 2019), and relative percent differences = ([species cover in 2021/total species cover in 2021] – [species cover in 2019/total species cover in 2019]). Asterisks denote significant differences between 2019 and 2021. Means and standard deviations of each growth form can be found in Supplemental Materials, Table S10.

Growth Form	Percent Difference Absolute (Relative)	Species	Percent Difference Absolute (Relative)
Bare Ground*	⁺83% (⁺4%)	Bare Soil	⁺86% (⁺3%)
Bare Ground*	⁺83% (⁺4%)	Rocks/Stones	⁺110% (⁺1%)
Litter*	⁺321% (⁺13%)	Loose Organic Matter	⁺58% (⁺0.2%)
		Plant Litter	⁺75% (⁺2%)
		Woody Litter	⁺10464% (⁺11%)
Deciduous Shrubs	⁻1% (⁻2%)	Arctous rubra	⁻13% (⁻1%)
		Salix arctica	⁻16% (⁻0.4%)
		Salix reticulata	⁺25% (⁺0.2%)
		Vaccinium uligonosum	⁻1% (⁻1%)
Evergreen Shrubs*	⁻31% (⁻8%)	Cassiope tetragona	⁻54% (⁻4 %)
		Dryas integrifolia	⁻0.4% (⁻1%)
		Empetrum nigrum	⁻12% (⁻0.3%)
		Rhododendron lapponicum	⁻61% (⁻2%)
		Rhododendron tomentosum	⁻43% (⁻1%)
		Vaccinium vitis-idaea	⁻8% (⁻0.3%)
Forbs*	⁺83% (⁺2%)	Bistorta vivipara	⁺208% (⁺1%)
		Cardamine digitata	⁺455% (⁺1%)
		Hedysarum alpinum	⁺58 % (⁺0.2%)
		Oxytropis arctica	⁻71% (⁻1%)
		Oxytropis maydelliana	⁺263% (⁺0.5%)
Graminoids*	⁺63% (⁺2%)	Carex bigelowii	⁺133% (⁺1%)
Graminoids*	⁺63% (⁺2%)	Carex rupestris	⁺18% (⁺0.03%)
Lichens*	⁻30% (⁻12%)	Alectoria ochroleuca	⁻33% (⁻3%)
		Cetraria nivalis	⁻38% (⁻4%)
		Cetraria ericetorum	⁻34% (⁻0.2%)
		Cladonia sp.	⁻75% (⁻0.5%)
		Dactylina arctica	⁻26% (⁻0.4%)
		Gowardia nigricans	⁻9% (⁻1%)
		Thamnolia vermicularis	⁻43% (⁻3%)
		Unidentified crustose lichen	⁻16% (⁻0.2%)
Mosses*	⁻19% (⁻2%)	Aulacomnium turgidum	⁺23% (⁺0.1%)
		Hylocomium splendens	⁻66% (⁻1%)
		Pohlia nutans	⁻22% (⁻1%)
		Polytrichastum pallidisetum	⁻91% (⁻0.5%)
		Bucklandiella microcarpa	⁺35% (⁺0.1%)
		Rhytidium rugosum	⁻31% (⁻0.4%)
		Sanionia uncinata	⁻10% (⁻0.1%)