Resistance is how much a community changes due to a particular disturbance. An example of resistance could be dune grass communities. On a individual level, species with long roots may be more resistant to high wind disturbances then species with shallow roots. At a community level, plant communities that grow in dense mats will better anchor sand dunes in place than a population that is composed of widely spaced individuals.
Resilience is the plant community or individuals ability to come back after a disturbance event. If you have a highly resilient community, its going to take more energy and factors involved to shift that community to an alternate stable state when compared to a community with low resilience. One factor that managers may consider is that disturbance may select for the more resilient and resistant indivisible in a plant community. Knowing what plant species will most likely survive and return after a disturbance will give land managers a better idea of what the post disturbance environment will look like.
Hi Matt. Good job contrasting resistance and resilience. It's so interesting to consider the traits of many species to survive. The Nature conservancy has an interesting article about Florida's 9 million acres of conservation land that they (the state's fire staff) and fire personnel from Spain are currently conducting prescribed burns. I'll post the link and a picture in another post. Interesting how one type of plant in the Florida flatwoods of various sub-species is carnivorous.
ReplyDeleteI looked at the article you mentioned and it was very interesting. It covers a lot of what we have talked about in this class. It doesn't specifically use the term resilience, however the article clearly addresses that plants have the ability to rebound after fire and gives some great examples. In the "home sweet home" slide show it provides many examples on how plants and animals deal with fire. That article definitely promotes a positive view on prescribed burning!
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