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High herbivore density associated with vegetation diversity in interglacial ecosystems
journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-08, 23:36 authored by Christopher SandomChristopher Sandom, Rasmus Ejrnaes, Morten D D Hansen, Jens-Christian SvenningThe impact of large herbivores on ecosystems before modern human activities is an open question in ecology and conservation. For Europe, the controversial wood-pasture hypothesis posits that grazing by wild large herbivores supported a dynamic mosaic of vegetation structures at the landscape scale under temperate conditions before agriculture. The contrasting position suggests that European temperate vegetation was primarily closed forest with relatively small open areas, at most impacted locally by large herbivores. Given the role of modern humans in the world-wide decimations of megafauna during the late Quaternary, to resolve this debate it is necessary to understand herbivore-vegetation interactions before these losses. Here, a synthetic analysis of beetle fossils from Great Britain shows that beetles associated with herbivore dung were better represented during the Last Interglacial (132,000-110,000 y B.P., before modern human arrival) than in the early Holocene (10,000-5,000 y B.P.). Furthermore, beetle assemblages indicate closed and partially closed forest in the early Holocene but a greater mixture of semiopen vegetation and forest in the Last Interglacial. Hence, abundant and diverse large herbivores appear to have been associated with high structural diversity of vegetation before the megafauna extinctions at the end of the Pleistocene. After these losses and in the presence of modern humans, large herbivores generally were less abundant, and closed woodland was more prevalent in the early Holocene. Our findings point to the importance of the formerly rich fauna of large herbivores in sustaining structurally diverse vegetation in the temperate forest biome and provide support for recent moves toward rewildingbased conservation management.
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Publication status
- Published
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- Published version
Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesISSN
0027-8424Publisher
National Academy of SciencesExternal DOI
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11Volume
111Page range
4162-4167Department affiliated with
- Biology and Environmental Science Publications
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- Yes
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- Yes
Legacy Posted Date
2015-12-02First Open Access (FOA) Date
2021-03-09First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date
2015-12-02Usage metrics
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