This study reports the relationship between the diversity and functioning of fungal and bacterial soil communities with vegetation in Mediterranean woodland that experienced severe die-off after a drought episode. Terminal restriction fragment length polymorfism (TRFLP) was used to describe microbial community structure and diversity five years after the episode in different habitats (Juniperus...

seed bank is a central topic for plant community restoration. we determined the potential and regeneration capacity of soil seed banks of woody plant patches in conservation of the vegetation in an alpine habitat, since vegetation has completely disappeared in some sites by intensive grazing in the habitat. the study was done in mountainous area of alborz in iran. a total of 20 individual shrub...

Hunting may have drastic effects on some populations of frugivores and seed dispersal agents, which in turn may affect patterns of forest regeneration and plant diversity. However, when a species disappears, it is possible that the population of other species increases due to competition release, compensating or not, their ecological roles. The main aim of this study was to measure density comp...

Plant communities are coupled with abiotic factors, as species diversity and community composition both respond to and influence climate and soil characteristics. Interactions between vegetation and abiotic factors depend on plant functional types (PFT) as different growth forms will have differential responses to and effects on site characteristics. However, despite the importance of different...

The islands of Torres Strait occupy a shallow area of submerged continental shelf narrowly separating Cape York Peninsula, Australia, from New Guinea. The human history of Torres Strait is unique with respect to mainland northern Australia. Island vegetation, however, exhibits a strong affinity with the environments of the western lowlands regions of Cape York Peninsula and with the vegetation ...

introduction:landscape structure means the pattern of a landscape, which is determined by its type of use, but also by its structure, i.e. the size, shape, arrangement and distribution of individual landscape elements. for the delineation of these landscape elements, or so-called patches, often land use or land cover units are used. in this context, “‘land cover’ refers to the physical surface ...

The physical structure of vegetation influences diversity, interactions, movement, and thermoregulation of animals. Vegetation structure might be a good indicator of habitat requirements of generalist predators, such as dragonflies and damselflies (order Odonata), and thereby affect species diversity. Odonates use aquatic and terrestrial habitats during larval and adult life stages, respectivel...

given the critical role played by urban green spaces and the emergence of remote sensing as avaluable natural resource management tool, this study sought to identify trends in green spaces within thecontext of south africa’s transition period (1990 - 2000). using the city of port elizabeth as a case study, threesets of landsat - 5 thematic mapper images (1990, 1995 and 2000) were geo-processed,...