Új cikk a Science of the Total Environment-ben

Megjelent legújabb cikkünk Valkó Orsolya elsőszerzőségével, mely szikes gyepekben bekövetkező egyszeri tervezett égetések hatását értékeli komplex több élőlénycsoportra és a talajra kiterjedő elemzésekkel. A cikk a Science of the Total Environment c. tudományos folyóiratban jelent meg. A cikk összefoglalója az alábbiakban olvasható a cikk pedig letölthető a folyóirat honlapján és a honlapomról.

Supporting biodiversity by prescribed burning in grasslands — A multi-taxa approach

Valkó O., Deák B., Magura T., Török P., Kelemen A., Tóth K., Horváth R., Nagy D. D.,  Debnár Zs., Zsigrai Gy., Kapocsi I., Tóthmérész B.

There are contrasting opinions on the use of prescribed burning management in European grasslands. On the one hand, prescribed burning can be effectively used for the management of open landscapes, controlling dominant species, reducing accumulated litter or decreasingwildfire risk. On the other hand burning can have a detrimental impact on grassland biodiversity by supporting competitor grasses and by threatening several rare and endangered species, especially arthropods.We studied the effects of prescribed burning in alkaline grasslands of high conservation interest. Our aim was to test whether dormant-season prescribed burning can be an alternative conservation measure in these grasslands. We selected six sites in East-Hungary: in three sites, a prescribed fire was applied in November 2011, while three sites remained unburnt. 

We studied the effects of burning on soil characteristics, plant biomass and on the composition of vegetation and arthropod assemblages (isopods, spiders, ground beetles and rove beetles). Soil pH, organic matter, potassium and phosphorous did not change, but soluble salt content increased significantly in the burnt sites. Prescribed burning had several positive effects from the nature conservation viewpoint. Shannon diversity and the number of flowering shoots were higher, and the cover of the dominant grass Festuca pseudovinawas lower in the burnt sites. Graminoid biomasswas lower,while total, green and forb biomass were higher in the burnt plots compared to the control. The key finding of our study was that prescribed burning did not decrease the abundance and diversity of arthropod taxa. Species-level analyses showed that out of themost abundant invertebrate species, 10were not affected, was negatively and was positively affected by burning. Moreover, our results suggest that prescribed burning leaving unburnt patches can be a viable management tool in open landscapes, because it supports plant diversity and does not threaten arthropods.