Bryophyte and lichen diversity of Austrian alpine grassland ecosystems and the implications of climate change. - Herzogia 37 : 246-269. Bryophytes and lichens, despite their contrasting ecological requirements, often coexist in alpine grassland habitats. Bryophytes favor cool, shaded, and moist conditions, while lichens prefer light and dry environments. Understanding their response to changing environmental factors offers insights into the impacts of climate change on vegetation. In our study, cryptogams were identified as significant components of alpine grasslands, with their proportions varying across plant communities. Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA) revealed that altitude, vascular plant cover, and temperature and precipitation factors are key in explaining cryptogam species composition. Nutrient availability supports bryophyte diversity, while continentality influences lichen distribution. Additionally, competition with vascular plants might affect cryptogam diversity, particularly for bryophytes, which thrive with lower herb layer cover. Beta- regression analysis confirmed different potential responses of bryophytes and lichens to climate change scenarios (rcp 4.5 and rcp 8.5). While global warming is generally expected to increase oceanity - potentially benefiting bryophytes and harming lichens - our findings suggest a different outcome. Drier summers, wetter winters, and rising temperatures are likely to favor lichens over bryophytes due to reduced humidity stability. Furthermore, only bryophytes may benefit from shifting to north-facing slopes. The rising competition from vascular plants, driven by global warming, could threaten specialized alpine cryptogam species, reducing their diversity and impacting snowbed vegetation.

Species distribution models (SDMs) are cost-effective, transparent and flexible planning tools to support various areas in nature conservation. Variables taken from remote sensing (RS) are broadly applicable to biodiversity studies. In our study, we combined RS-variables (normalized differenced vegetation index and land surface temperatures), with topographic and geological variables to produce detailed SDMs in the context of a seed collection campaign of the Alpine Seed Conservation and Research Project. To identify effective predictor variable combinations we compiled three different variable sets and compared the predictive model performance. The full model, that combines all types of variables, slightly outperforms (average values for TSS: 0.91, AUC: 0.98, Kappa: 0.7) models that use topo-climatic variables (average values for TSS: 0.91, AUC: 0.98, Kappa: 0.68) or NDVI (average values for TSS: 0.85, AUC: 0.96, Kappa: 0.54) alone. We also produced ensemble models that performed slightly better compared to the different model algorithms used in our approach. We identified the temperature of the coldest month, mean NDVI and bedrock as important variables that determine the distribution of alpine plant species. Our full models show high accordance with actual species distribution ranges and are highly relevant for efforts to identify special areas for either in-situ or ex-situ conservation. (C) 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier GmbH on behalf of Gesellschaft fur &Okologie.

Nuphar pumila is a glacial relict, which is nowadays rare throughout Europe and red-listed in most European regions. In Switzerland only three autochthonous populations and one population of the hybrid with N. lutea (N. xspenneriana) have survived to date, one of them in the canton of Zurich. To protect this species regionally, the canton of Zurich has commissioned the ex situ propagation of specimens, which then had been introduced to 37 water bodies in protected areas, including one known former site. Since only about 10% of these introductions had been successful, there was a wish to identify causes of this lack of success. To this end, we compared the vegetation and physical-chemical parameters of the four natural sites in Switzerland with the successful and unsuccessful introduction sites. Additionally, for a subset of sites, we assessed diatom genus composition as a proxy of water quality. Moreover, we derived vegetation plots of N. pumila and N. lutea from across Europe from the European Vegetation Archive (EVA) to compare their site conditions, using mean ecological indicator values and bioclimatic variables of the localities. We found that inside Switzerland the main differences were between the natural sites and all introduction sites, while successful and unsuccessful introduction sites hardly differed in the determined parameters. Natural sites had cooler water with lower magnesium content, and according to mean ecological indicator values, also lower nutrient status. The diatom data, though limited in amount, point into the same direction. The EVA data demonstrate that stands of N. pumila are mainly more oligotrophic, but also cooler and more acidic than those of N. lutea. We could not find any factor that explains the success vs. lack of success of plantations of N. pumila in multiple sites in the canton of Zurich, but our results rather indicate that due to the relatively warm climate, the high atmogenic nitrogen input and the predominantly base-rich bedrock, the sites in the canton are generally not particularly well suited for N. pumila. We consider it therefore more promising to protect and possibly (re-) introduce N. pumila in other cantons with higher elevation, base-poor bedrock and lower atmogenic nitrogen input.

Storing seeds in seed banks is an effective way to preserve plant diversity and conserve species. An essential step towards a valuable conservation is the validation of germination. This study presents a germination screening of seeds from 255 species of the European Eastern Alps, which were to be stored at the Millennium Seed Bank (Kew, UK). The final germination percentage (FGP) was determined using a standard protocol in the laboratory. Species were classified according to species rarity, plant community, occurrence at elevation belts, bedrock types, as well as CSR strategies, and further, seed mass was examined. We could not find statistically significant differences of FGP within these classes, but 74.9% of all tested species germinated using the standard protocol, and half of them had FGP ≥ 20.1–100%. A treatment with gibberellic acid enhanced the germination in half of the species to which this treatment was applied. Common families in alpine regions, i.e. Asteraceae, Poaceae and Saxifragaceae were highlighted in terms of their germination behaviour. The results provide an evaluation of the application of standard protocols to a broad Alpine species pool on the one hand, and on the other hand, provide ecological insights of the species tested. Germination is not only one of the most important events of the reproductive cycle of plants but could also be a key feature in species' responses to changing environmental conditions.

At the European level, the Natura 2000 habitat network is the main instrument for preserving and protecting species and habitats. However, protected areas are fixed in location, and environmental conditions continually subject to change. Changing conditions force species to shift their geographic distribution or to adapt to new conditions, ultimately causing a change in the composition of the habitats’ species. We modelled the response of two important alpine EU habitat types (6150, 6170) in the Styrian Eastern Alps to increasing temperatures using two representative concentration pathways (rcp 4.5 and rcp 8.5) of the regional climate model CCLM4-8-17 CLMcom. Our results confirmed that climate change within the next several decades will have an immediate and profound impact on the Alpine flora and their habitats. The niche models indicate a dramatic reduction in the habitat suitability of 15 habitat diagnostic species before the end of the twenty-first century. Habitat change was found to be slower inside protected areas in the first half of the twenty-first century, while in the second half of the twenty-first century, suitable habitat conditions either remained constant for the lower temperature scenario (rcp 4.5) or shifted to “outside” current protected areas in the severe scenario (rcp 8.5). Regions of rapidly changing habitat suitability and subsequently shifting species composition can be found both inside and outside of the protected area network. These developments may lead to the deterioration of the conservation status of habitat types and challenge the aims of the EU habitat directive.

Dear members of the Eurasian Dry Grassland Group, We present you the new issue of the EDGG Bulletin, in which you will find detailed announcements of two annual events of our group -the Eurasian Grassland Conference, which will be held in Sulmona (Italy) from 4 to 8 June and the Field Workshop in inneralpine dry valleys, Austria from 6 to 13 July. We hope that they will attract your attention and you will find a place for them in the upcoming field season. Additionally, you can find a report from the last Field Workshop, which took place in Italy, with a detailed photo diary. You can learn about the project on grassland management from

Safeguarding plants as seeds in ex situ collections is a cost effective element in an integrated plant conservation approach. The European Alps are a regional centre of plant diversity. Six institutions have established a regional network covering the European Alps which will conserve at least 500 priority plant species and which will improve the conservation status of plant species in grassland communities in the subalpine, alpine and nival altitudinal belts. Targeted research will expand the knowledge of the ecology of target species. Public engagement activities will raise the awareness for the importance of specific conservation actions in the European Alps.

Abstract: Berg, C., Schwager, P., Pöltl, M. & Dengler, J. 2016. Plot sizes used for phytosociological sampling of bryophyte and lichen micro-communities. — Herzogia 29: 654–667. To study the ecology of bryophytes and lichens, a plot-based approach in the tradition of phytosociology is widely used in Europe. Plot size has a crucial influence on the outcome of various analyses. Vegetation-environment analyses, biodiversity studies and vegetation classifications can be strongly biased if different plot sizes are compared or combined. For this reason, standard plot sizes have been recommended repeatedly. We collected 122 articles from eight international journals to analyse which plot sizes they used for sampling bryophyte and lichen communities. We found 11,573 relevés from 19 European countries, with German data and bryophyte communities being prevailing. Overall plot sizes ranged from 0.0002 to 30 m2. The medians of plots sizes of saxicolous, corticolous, terricolous and lignicolous communities were all in the range of 0.04 to 0.09 m2. Much smaller plots were used for bird casts and for epiphyllous micro-communities, with the smallest plots being only 2.1 cm2 in size. The largest plots exceeded 1m2 and were mostly used for terricolous lichen communities, in which most authors also recorded vascular plants. The most frequently used plot sizes in all data were 0.04, 0.01 and 0.03 m2, while differences between the substrate types and among the two taxa were of subordinate importance. To replace the former vague criteria used to determine the plot size, like minimum area, representativeness and homogeneity, we recommend the use of a standard plot size for future studies of cryptogam micro-communities. To achieve best-possible compatibility with former studies, 0.04m2 (20cm × 20 cm) appears as a good option. If cryptogam-rich vegetation types regularly cover many square metres or even hectares, we recommend to analyse them not only as micro-communities, but, including the co-occurring vascular plants and using plot sizes of 4–16 m2, also as part of the normal system of complete plant communities, where such types typically had been neglected. Finally, we emphasize the fundamental difference between complete phytocoenoses, which alone should be considered in conventional syntaxonomy, and partial communities (merocoenoses, synusia), which better should be treated in a parallel classification system with its own ranks. Plot size can be considered as strong circumstantial evidence, whether a record refers to a complete phytocoenosis or to a synusia. We recommend assuming for plot sizes below 1 m2 that they are either synusiae or incomplete records of phytocoenoses, thus in either case not suitable for conventional syntaxonomy. Syntaxa based on such micro-plots should generally be considered as invalid.