Effetto di specie esotiche sulla diversità tassonomica, funzionale e filogenetica delle comunità di cannuccia di palude

Abstract

Macrophytes have a pivotal role as point of interaction between many of the organisms, and the water and sediment chemistry in a freshwater system. Despite their low floristic diversity, reeds beds can support a wide range of wildlife, and provide a variety of functions for the wetland ecosystems. Recent studies show the existence of a threshold effect of alien plant cover or density on plant communities dominated by P. australis, whereby more increased the alien plant impact is, more reduced may be the native plant species diversity. However, many of these studies were based on taxonomical or traits information, whereas no investigations have considered the phylogenetic dimension so far. This study aims to investigate the incidence of alien species on the phylogenetic diversity of wetland vegetation dominated by P. australis. To do this, we investigated the floristic composition of a total of 98 natural reeds beds from Tuscany, Umbria, and Lazio, analysing separately lentic and lotic communities. We constructed a phylogenetic tree of the plant species and compared the differences in taxonomic/functional/phylogenetic diversity, evaluating the role of the incidence of the alien species. The results showed that the relative abundance of exotic plant species is positively related to the taxonomic diversity of the common reeds communities and doesn’t affect the phylogenetic diversity. Probably, the human impact promoted the entrance of the exotic species already represented at evolutionary level. Also, the presence of exotic species influenced functional diversity, especially it promoted the adaptive strategies ruderals of the communities.

Keywords

master's thesis;phylogeny;Phragmites australis;wetlands;exotic species;taxonomic diversity;functional diversity;

Data

Language:	Italian
Year of publishing:	2020
Typology:	2.09 - Master's Thesis
Organization:	UNG - University of Nova Gorica
Publisher:	[C. D'Ercole]
UDC:	575.8
COBISS:	44075779
Views:	1476
Downloads:	0
Average score:	0 (0 votes)
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Other data

Secondary title:	ǂThe ǂeffect of exotic plant species on taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic diversity of common reeds communities
URN:	URN:SI:UNG
Type (COBISS):	Master's thesis/paper
Thesis comment:	Univ. degli Studi di Firenze, Scuola di Scienze Matematiche, Fisiche e Naturali
Pages:	55 str.
ID:	12307782