Maintaining tree islands in the Florida Everglades: nutrient redistribution is the key
Date
Authors
Major Professor
Advisor
Committee Member
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
The Florida Everglades is an oligotrophic wetland system with tree islands as one of its most prominent landscape features. Total soil phosphorus concentrations on tree islands can be 6 to 100 times greater than phosphorus levels in the surrounding marshes and sloughs, making tree islands nutrient hotspots. Several mechanisms are believed to redistribute phosphorus to tree islands: subsurface water flows generated by evapotranspiration of trees, higher deposition rates of dry fallout, deposition of guano by birds and other animals, groundwater upwelling, and bedrock mineralization by tree exudates. A conceptual model is proposed, in which the focused redistribution of limiting nutrients, especially phosphorus, onto tree islands controls their maintenance and expansion. Because of increased primary production and peat accretion rates, the redistribution of phosphorus can result in an increase in both tree island elevation and size. Human changes to hydrology have greatly decreased the number and size of tree islands in parts of the Everglades. The proposed model suggests that the preservation of existing tree islands, and ultimately of the Everglades landscape, requires the maintenance of these phosphorus redistribution mechanisms.
Series Number
Journal Issue
Is Version Of
Versions
Series
Academic or Administrative Unit
Type
Comments
This article is published as Wetzel, Paul R., Arnold G. Van Der Valk, Susan Newman, Dale E. Gawlik, Tiffany Troxler Gann, Carlos A. Coronado-Molina, Daniel L. Childers, and Fred H. Sklar. "Maintaining tree islands in the Florida Everglades: nutrient redistribution is the key." Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 3, no. 7 (2005): 370-376. doi: 10.1890/1540-9295(2005)003[0370:MTIITF]2.0.CO;2. Posted with permission.