Ask anyone if piping plovers or polar bears are important, and you’ll hear a resounding “yes,” but what about the importance of plants? They are key to maintaining ecosystem stability; provide food and habitat for birds, bears, and other wildlife; and are essential for human survival. However, many
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| Protecting plant diversity is important, too. |
plants are endangered due to urbanization and other land use changes, pollution, unsustainable practices, the spread of invasive alien species, and climate change. As 2010 was the International Year of Biodiversity, we decided to reflect on some of OFRI’s plant diversity research that will contribute to Ontario’s Biodiversity Strategy.
While boreal forests are less diverse than others due to a cold climate and short growing season, they do support more than 1,200 plant species. Understanding this diversity is a first step in determining how forest practices might affect it and how to minimize effects.
OFRI researcher Wayne Bell has spent much of the past two decades working with partners to understand and document plant diversity in Ontario’s forests. He says, “In addition to learning what’s out there, much of our effort has gone into understanding these plants and their traits – how they regenerate, where they grow, what affects their growth and development, how they interact with other plants and animals, and how they respond to disturbances such as fire and forestry practices.”
Bell’s Plant Ecology, Diversity, and Early Succession Program (PEDS) is dedicated to understanding plant diversity and has five components:
- Understanding the ecology of Ontario’s forest plants
- Developing and maintaining an inventory of those plants
- Developing a plant trait database
- Monitoring long-term plots to determine disturbance effects
- Actively managing for non-timber forest products
Understanding basic plant ecology
Bell began looking at plant ecology in 1988. Under the guidance of Bill Towill, now science and technology coordinator with MNR’s Northwest Science and Information Section in Thunder Bay, Bell reviewed the ecology of 18 species that compete with conifers in northwestern Ontario. Since then, several others have reviewed and synthesized information on over 200 other species, including ones that are rare or invasive. Understanding basic plant autecology – the relationship of an organism or species to its environment – helps researchers to figure out how best to minimize and/or control the invasives and prevent further loss of at risk species.
Such reviews also help to identify information gaps. For example, lichens are an important food source for caribou, but the synthesis work revealed that little is known about how lichens respond to herbicides. As a result, Bell set up a study to determine lichen tolerance to herbicides, which is being carried out by the University of Guelph’s Troy McMullin and Steve Newmaster. Bell and Newmaster are also leading the writing of a book summarizing the autecology of Ontario’s plant species, which will be available through the University of Guelph in 2011. It will interest not only forest managers but also those involved in pit and quarry rehabilitation and right-of-way corridor maintenance, wildlife managers, students, those who harvest wild plants, and gardeners interested in native plants.
Other contributors to the book are Maureen Kershaw, a consultant in Sudbury, ON; Cathy Bentley (formerly with MNR); Fred Pinto, MNR’s Southern Science and Information Section; Ngaire Eskelin and Jennifer Dacosta, OFRI; Troy McMullin and Andy Gordon, University of Guelph; Steven Hart and Nancy Luckai, Lakehead University; and Kathleen Brosemer, formerly with Forest Genetics Ontario.
Documenting what grows in Ontario’s forests
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| OFRI forest research ecologist Jennifer Dacosta assesses species diversity and crop tree stocking on one of the eight NEBIE study sites, where researchers are documenting the effects of various intensities of silviculture on forest ecosystems. |
In the mid-1990s, MNR’s vegetation management, ecological land classification, and growth and yield programs called for an inventory of Ontario’s plants, a library of plant samples or herbarium to use for reference, and consistent naming conventions.
At the time, Bell worked with MNR colleagues Jim Hayden (then with the Growth and Yield Program) and Peter Uhlig (with the Ecological Land Classification [ELC] Program) to compile the first edition of the Ontario Plant List. Now ELC staff work with Newmaster to maintain this list, which is available through MNR’s Natural Heritage Information Centre within their Biodiversity Explorer and includes 4,049 plants, 533 mosses, 730 lichens, as well as the University of Guelph’s FLORA Ontario – Integrated Botanical Information System, which includes 5,039 species.
As well, Newmaster and Bell encouraged the establishment of an educational herbarium for students of Sault College and the development of the Northern Ontario Plant Database (NOP), led by professor Sue Meades, now retired from Algoma University. Bell’s field staff continue to add specimens to the latter collection.
“Both products provide baseline knowledge of which species grow where and help to ensure consistency in identifying and naming Ontario plants,” Newmaster says. “In doing so, we filled a key void in Ontario’s plant diversity work.”
Compiling information about plant traits
“A plant trait approach allows us to scale up what we know about the autecology of individual species into a global understanding of their role in crucial ecosystem processes,” explains Isabelle Aubin, a Canadian Forest Service-Great Lakes Forestry Centre research scientist with whom Bell is working. “Developing and applying a plant trait database not only to helps us optimize forest management practices but also maintain the functional, structural, and species diversity on the landscape.”
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| A rich diversity of trees and plants helps Ontario's wildlife by providing food and shelter. |
She adds that emphasis on forest sustainability has increased in recent years, so this optimization has become even more important. “Looking at the functional traits of groups of similar plants can help us to model how a species community will react to a specific disturbance based on universal characteristics, such as seed dispersal mode or shade tolerance. For example, plant functional classifications were proposed in the early to mid-1990s as a tool to model changes in vegetation and ecosystem function caused by changes in climate and carbon dioxide.”
Bell will contribute to Aubin’s plant traits of Canada database and learn from her how to incorporate the information into his current research on the effects of disturbance on plant communities. Their plant trait work will contribute to international databases − such as TRY − that are being compiled and used in global efforts to model plant community responses to disturbance and climate change.
Monitoring long-term response to disturbance
Monitoring long-term plots is key to detecting the loss of or new species, Bell says. Since the early 1990s, he and Newmaster have been working with several colleagues and partners to document plant diversity in Ontario’s boreal forests. From long-term monitoring of over 10,000 plots in 20 studies, they’ve documented the effects of using vegetation management alternatives, intensifying silviculture, and harvesting biomass.
Bell reports, “In the NEBIE Plot Network, a study of the effects of silvicultural intensities on eight forest types, we’ve had sites with as few as 77 plant species or as many as 256. Clearly, forest management practices can both increase and decrease diversity.”
For details about the NEBIE project, see Insights Vol. 8 No. 1. Formal results from this work will be available by 2012.
Managing for non-timber forest products
Bell says one of the next steps is to apply what they’ve learned to managing for non-timber forest products and wildlife habitat. For example, through a partnership with Tom McLean, Nipissing Forest Resource Management, Inc., and OFRI’s Tom Noland, researchers planted Canada yew at the North Bay NEBIE site to document the feasibility of co-producing timber and a non-timber forest product. (Canada yew is a source of anticancer agents.)
In addition to discovering more about native plants, their research has allowed them to document which invasive alien plants are growing in boreal forests.
The section on invasive plants in MNR’s soon-to-be released 2011 State of the Forest Report is largely based on information from their studies. “My partners and I have been collecting the building blocks of understanding plant diversity for years,” Bell notes. “Now we can start to put them together and apply this knowledge to our advantage in research and management to minimize the effects of human activities.”
Bell’s collaborators on long-term monitoring of effects of management practices on plant diversity and response to disturbance: Steve Newmaster and Troy McMullin (University of Guelph); Isabelle Aubin (Canadian Forest Service); Nancy Luckai and Azim Mallik (Lakehead University); Jennifer Dacosta, John Winters, Andrée Morneault, and Bill Towill (MNR); and Sue Meades (Algoma University-retired).
Want to read more?
The Effects of Silvicultural Disturbances on Phanerogam Diversity in the Boreal Mixed Wood Forest (order PDF)
The Effects of Silvicultural Disturbances on Cryptogam Diversity in the Boreal Mixed Wood Forest
Effectiveness of Delayed Brush Cutting and Herbicide Treatments for Vegetation Control in a Seven-Year-Old Jack Pine Plantation in Northwestern Ontario, Canada
Restoration of Floral Diversity Through Plantations on Abandoned Agricultural Land
Do Tree-Level Monocultures Develop Following Canadian Boreal Silviculture? Tree-Level Diversity Tested Using A New Method
Long-Term Effects of Intensive Silvicultural Practices on Productivity, Composition, and Structure of Northern Temperate and Boreal Plantations in Ontario, Canada
Effects of Forest Floor Disturbances by Mechanical Site Preparation on Floristic Diversity in a Central Ontario Clearcut (order PDF)
Influence of Microhabitat on Bryophyte Diversity in Ontario Mixedwood Boreal Forest (order PDF)
