BIOLS340

CH20: Succession & stability

Done by: Yousif Adel
-Maple trees and conifers along the edge of a swamp. The accumulation
of plant organic matter will gradually fill in the swamp, which as it
dries and develops soil, will be colonized by grasses, shrubs and trees.
Eventually, a succession of physical and biological changes will
transform this aquatic ecosystem into a forest
-Studies of succession show that communities and ecosystems are not
static but constantly change in response to disturbance, environmental
change and their own internal dynamics

Definitions
-Succession: gradual change in plant and animal communities in an
area following disturbance
-Primary succession: succession on newly exposed geological
substrates
-Secondary succession: succession following disturbance that
does not destroy soil
-Climax Community: late successional community that remains stable
until disrupted by disturbance

20.1: Community changes during succession

 Community changes during succession include:
1.Increases in species diversity
2.Changes in species composition

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-Primary Succession at Glacier Bay:
-Reiners et al. (1971) studied changes in plant diversity during
succession
-The study sites ranged in age (that is, time since glacial retreat,
from 10-1,500 years)
-Reiners et al. (1971) found that:
-Total number of plant species increased with plot age
-Species richness increased rapidly in early years of succession and
more slowly during later stages
-Not all groups increased in density throughout succession

Secondary succession in temperate forests

-Oosting (1942) found number of woody plant species increased during
secondary succession at Piedmont Plateau (150-200 years)
-Johnston and Odum (1956) found increase in bird diversity across
successional sequence closely paralleled increase in woody plant
diversity observed by Oosting

Succession in rocky intertidal communities

-Wayne Sousa (1979a, 1979b) showed that the first species to colonize
open space on intertidal rocks were a green alga in the genus Ulva and
the barnacle Chthamalus fissus
-The next arrivals were several species of perennial red algae: Gelidium
coulteri, Gigartina leptorhynchos, Rhodoglossum affine and Gigartina
canaliculate
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-Finally, if there was no disturbance for 2-3 years, Gigartina canaliculate
grew over the other species and dominated 60-90% of the space
-Succession in the intertidal zone involves colonization and competition
for limited space among species as different as attached marine algae,
sea anemones, mussels and barnacles
-Sousa (1979) explored succession on intertidal boulders with several
experiments
-He followed succession on small boulders that he had cleaned and
stabilized
-The number of species increased with time (average number of species
increased until about 1-1.5 years and then leveled off at about 5 species)

20.2: Ecosystem changes during succession

 Ecosystem changes during succession include:
 Increases in biomass, primary production, respiration and nutrient
retention
-As succession changes the diversity and composition of communities,
ecosystem properties change as well

Ecosystem changes at glacier bay

-Chapin et al. (1994) documented substantial changes in ecosystem
structure during succession at Glacier Bay:
-One of the most fundamental characteristics was the quantity of soil
-Total soil depth and the depth of all major soil horizons all show
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 significant increases from the pioneer community to the spruce
stage
-Soil properties (influencing the kinds of organisms that can grow) also
changed during succession
-Organic content, moisture and nitrogen concentrations of the soil all
increased substantially
-Over the same successional sequence, soil bulk density, pH &
phosphorus concentration all decreased
-Physical and biological properties of ecosystems are inseparable:
-Organisms acting upon mineral substrates contribute to the
building of soils, upon which spruce forests eventually grow
around Glacier Bay
-Soils strongly influence the kinds of organisms that grow in a
place

4-Million years of ecosystem change

-Chronosequence: a series of communities or ecosystems representing
a range of ages or times since disturbance
-Hedin et al. (2003) studied Hawaiian Islands, which have formed over
hot spots on the Pacific plate, forming an island chain varying greatly in
age due to volcanic lava flows (300-4,100,000 years)
-Over the chronosequence, Hedin et al. encountered significant changes
in a wide range of soil features
-Primary production in the Hawaiian forest ecosystems is limited by
nitrogen early in succession and by phosphorus later in succession
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-Organic matter (which is absent from fresh lava), increased in soils over
the first 150,000 years of the chronosequence
-Analogous increases in soil organic matter also occur over the course of
succession
-Changes in soil nitrogen content followed almost precisely the pattern
exhibited by soil organic matter
-Different patterns of nutrient distribution across the chronosequence
 There were changes in rates of nutrient loss across the
chronosequence.
 Most of the losses are due to leaching to groundwater

20.3: Succession mechanisms

-Mechanisms that drive ecological succession include facilitation,
tolerance and inhibition
-Clements (1916):
 Facilitation
-Connell and Slatyer (1977):
 Facilitation
 Tolerance
 Inhibition

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 Facilitation
-Proposes many species may attempt to colonize newly available space
-Only certain species will initially establish
-Colonizing “Pioneer Species” modify environment so it
becomes less suitable for themselves and more suitable
for species of later successional stages
-The climax community occurs when resident species no longer
facilitate colonization by additional species

Tolerance
-Initial stages of colonization are not limited to pioneer species
-Early successional species do not facilitate later successional
species, but do change the environment
-Species remain, leave or establish based on tolerance to
environment

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-Long lived species are most broadly tolerant to a range of
environmental change

Inhibition
-Like tolerance model, inhibition model assumes that any species that
can survive in an area as an adult can colonize the area during the early
stages of succession
-Early occupants of an area modify the environment in a way that makes
it less suitable for both early and late successional species
-Early arrivals inhibit colonization by later arrivals
 Assures late successional species dominate an area.
 Because they live a long time and resist damage by physical and
biological factors (long lived, resistant species)
-Later successional species can only invade an area if space is opened up
by disturbance of early colonists

Successional mechanisms in
rocky intertidal zone
-Sousa investigated mechanisms behind succession of algae and
barnacles in intertidal boulder fields
-Results showed early successional species had lowest
survivorship and were more vulnerable to herbivores, supporting
the inhibition model
-Turner (1983) however, found that recruitment of surfgrass,
Phyllospadix scouleri, was dependent on its seeds hooking onto
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macroalgae, supporting the facilitation model

20.4: Community & ecosystem stability

-Community stability may be due to lack of disturbance or community
resistance or resilience in the face of disturbance
-Stability: the absence of change. Or the persistence of a community or
ecosystem in the face of disturbance
-Resistance: the ability of a community or ecosystem to maintain
structure and/or function in the face of potential disturbance
-Resilience: the ability of a community or ecosystem to return to its
former state

Applications: ecological succession

informing ecological restoration
-Ecological restoration: the process of restoring damaged ecosystems
to acceptable levels of biodiversity, physical structure and ecosystem
functioning
-Restoration has been suggested to be “essentially the manipulation of
succession in order to achieve some predetermined goal”

Restoring tropical forest

-Tropical forests are increasingly the focus of intense economic activity
ranging from clearing for agriculture to mining

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-The mining of bauxite (an ore of aluminum), occurs mainly in tropical
and subtropical regions and can have major impacts on these landscapes
-Bauxite mines (Australia), can remove vegetation from large areas and
produce massive tailing piles. Ecological restoration is generally needed
to stabilize exposed soils and tailings to prevent erosion and
sedimentation damage to nearby ecosystems
-Dias et al. (2012) added forest floor litter and seeded bauxite mining
tailings
-Succession on the tailings was promoted with faster plant growth,
greater leaf area, increased plant species richness and higher
seedling densities
-Shiels and Walker (2003) added tree branches to landslides in Puerto
Rico
-The branches acted as bird perches (roosts) which fostered seed
dispersal of additional plant species under the perches

Restoring logging road beds

-A dense network of roads is one of the common legacies of timber
harvests
-These logging roads have a number of environmental impacts,
including heavy erosion and sedimentation of nearby watercourses
-Logging roads (such as the one in Oregon), which create a surface bare
of vegetation and a topographic anomaly in the landscape, are a
significant source of erosion and of sedimentation in nearby streams and

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rivers
-Lloyd et al. (2013) compared abandoned roads to roads that were
recontoured to restore the original contours of the site
-The team found that recontouring accelerated restoration
-Plant diversity was different, but after 10 years soil structure on
recontoured roads was indistinguishable from undisturbed sites

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