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Decadal shifts in grass and woody plant cover are driven by prolonged drying and modified by topo‐edaphic properties

Overview of attention for article published in Ecological Applications, September 2016
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Title
Decadal shifts in grass and woody plant cover are driven by prolonged drying and modified by topo‐edaphic properties
Published in
Ecological Applications, September 2016
DOI 10.1002/eap.1389
Pubmed ID
Authors

Seth M. Munson, Temuulen T. Sankey, George Xian, Miguel L. Villarreal, Collin G. Homer

Abstract

Woody plant encroachment and overall declines in perennial vegetation in dryland regions can alter ecosystem properties and indicate land degradation, but the causes of these shifts remain controversial. Determining how changes in the abundance and distribution of grass and woody plants are influenced by conditions that regulate water availability at a regional scale provides a baseline to compare how management actions alter the composition of these vegetation types at a more local scale and can be used to predict future shifts under climate change. Using a remote-sensing-based approach, we assessed the balance between grasses and woody plants and how climate and topo-edaphic conditions affected their abundances across the northern Sonoran Desert from 1989 to 2009. Despite widespread woody plant encroachment in this region over the last 150 years, we found that leguminous trees, including mesquite (Prosopis spp.), declined in cover in areas with prolonged drying conditions during the early 21st century. Creosote bush (Larrea tridentata) also had moderate decreases with prolonged drying but was buffered from changes on soils with low clay that promote infiltration and high available water capacity that allows for retention of water at depth. Perennial grasses have expanded and contracted over the last two decades in response to summer precipitation and were especially dynamic on shallow soils with high clay that have large fluctuations in water availability. Our results suggest that topo-edaphic properties can amplify or ameliorate climate-induced changes in woody plants and perennial grasses. Understanding these relationships has important implications for ecosystem function under climate change in the southwestern USA and can inform management efforts to regulate grass and woody plant abundances.

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X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profile of 1 X user who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 52 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Spain 1 2%
United States 1 2%
Unknown 50 96%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Researcher 12 23%
Student > Ph. D. Student 10 19%
Student > Master 5 10%
Professor 4 8%
Other 3 6%
Other 8 15%
Unknown 10 19%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Agricultural and Biological Sciences 17 33%
Environmental Science 14 27%
Earth and Planetary Sciences 3 6%
Nursing and Health Professions 2 4%
Social Sciences 2 4%
Other 1 2%
Unknown 13 25%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 1. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 05 October 2016.
All research outputs
#15,383,207
of 22,886,568 outputs
Outputs from Ecological Applications
#2,693
of 3,181 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#203,988
of 322,481 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Ecological Applications
#53
of 69 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 22,886,568 research outputs across all sources so far. This one is in the 22nd percentile – i.e., 22% of other outputs scored the same or lower than it.
So far Altmetric has tracked 3,181 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 15.3. This one is in the 9th percentile – i.e., 9% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 322,481 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one is in the 28th percentile – i.e., 28% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.
We're also able to compare this research output to 69 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one is in the 18th percentile – i.e., 18% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.