Brunet, Jörg
- Southern Swedish Forest Research Centre, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Abstract
Fragmentation strongly shapes the distribution of organisms within forest patches through contrasting environmental conditions between the edge and interior habitat. Edge-to-interior distribution patterns are, however, poorly studied for litter- and soil-dwelling fauna, such as terrestrial gastropods, despite their high densities and significant impact on ecosystem processes, as both herbivores and detritivores. Therefore, we investigated edge-to-interior abundance patterns of terrestrial gastropods in 224 fragmented forest patches across Western Europe. Catching over 15,000 gastropods, we found that slug abundance is reduced in forest edges, while snail abundance shows no response on the edge effect. We hypothesize that these patterns could be explained by higher drought tolerance of snails, since forest edges have reduced air and soil humidity and elevated temperatures compared to forest interiors. Reduced slug abundance in forest edges potentially has ecological consequences for herbivory in and outside forest patches and nutrient cycling.
Keywords
Edge effects; Forest fragmentation; Gastropoda; Terrestrial molluscs
Published in
Pedobiologia
2019, volume: 75, pages: 34-37
Publisher: ELSEVIER GMBH
SLU Authors
Associated SLU-program
SLU Plant Protection Network
Global goals (SDG)
UKÄ Subject classification
Ecology
Forest Science
Publication identifier
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pedobi.2019.05.004
Permanent link to this page (URI)
https://res.slu.se/id/publ/101050