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ARS Home » Plains Area » Las Cruces, New Mexico » Range Management Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #345696
Title: Controls on vegetation – soil moisture coupling in arid shrublands during drought elicited through long-term data

Author
item PETRIE, MATTHEW - New Mexico State University
item Peters, Debra

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 6/2/2017
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Our goal was to quantify variation in ecological responses to sustained period of moisture limitation (ecological drought) across a semiarid ecological landscape in northern Chihuahuan Desert, USA. We obtained long-term meteorological, ecological site, soil moisture and aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) data from 1990-2015 for nine semiarid shrublands located on heterogeneous sites at the Joranda Basin LTER. We contrasted the coupling of woody and herbaceous productivity and ecological drought conditions (as Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) and soil moisture) between these shrublands sites, and related this coupling to variation in soil conditions and ecosystem type based on dominant shrub species during drought periods of varying duration and intensity. We found a broad range of variation in coupling of SPEI, soil moisture and ANPP at these sites, and found variation in soil type to play a strong role in regulating ecological landscape heterogeneity, although this effect varied at different levels of moisture limitation. We emphasize the value of representing variation in ecological responses to external forcings, especially in the context of multi-site, regional studies and modeling approaches, where uncertainty in ecological responses may not otherwise be accounted for.