Applied vegetation science addresses emerging global issues

Abstract

In 2019 Applied Vegetation Science is publishing its 22nd volume and with its first issue, the total number of papers published by the journal will exceed one thousand! Such a number of papers published over more than two decades show how vital and consolidated this journal covering all applied topics in vegetation science is (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/1654109x). Although vegetation science was for a long time a discipline with a strong descriptive focus, it has advanced in both theoretical and applied aspects and is now a well-established discipline within ecology. A key role in this development has been played by the IAVS journals, with the Journal of Vegetation Science entering its 30th volume (Chytrý, Chiarucci, Pärtel, Pillar, Bakker, Mucina, Peet, & White, 2019). Among the most important and most promising developments of vegetation science are those related to the application of knowledge, approaches, and methods developed by vegetation scientists in the real world, such as those related to the management and conservation of ecosystems and habitats. Targeting these was exactly the aim of van der Maarel, Mucina, and White (1998) when they launched Applied Vegetation Science as a new journal of the International Association for Vegetation Science. Unprecedented challenges are emerging for our planet and its natural life, such as those related to climate change or the degradation of natural ecosystems. In this context, vegetation science can play a major role in contributing to the progress of knowledge for sustainable development. Plant biomass represents more than 80% of the total biomass present on Earth (Bar-On, Phillips, & Milo, 2018). Despite the contribution of crops and forestry plantations to this biomass, a vast proportion of it is represented by natural and semi-natural ecosystems and, therefore, any major changes to the functioning of the planet's biosphere are mediated by vegetation. Despite this importance, the contribution of vegetation scientists to solving global policy issues has not been properly recognized. As a clear example of the involvement of vegetation scientists in the management of natural resources and developing ecologically sound practices, we can mention the resolution issued by the IAVS based on the move during the 2017 Palermo symposium regarding the catastrophic forest fires in Portugal (http://iavs.org/About/IAVS-News/IAVS-Resolution-on-Portugal.aspx). Scientifically sound recommendations for society-oriented ecosystem management were made, pointing out that these fires have been largely the result of widespread plantations of pines and eucalypts, the over-accumulation of highly flammable litter and the transformation of traditional landscapes. The Editor's Award for 2018 goes to László Erdős for the paper “The edge of two worlds: A new review and synthesis on Eurasian forest-steppes”. This paper could be perceived as a sort of traditional paper describing the large-scale vegetation of a single biome, the Eurasian forest-steppes. However, it contains much more than a description of these vegetation types. The authors provided an updated overview of forest-steppe ecosystems across Europe and Asia, by giving clear and useful information and providing a serious outlook on biodiversity conservation issues and a future prospect under predicted climate changes. The award-winning paper by Erdős et al. (2018) was produced as a joint effort by researchers from six Eurasian countries where forest-steppes are a major component of existing ecosystems. The paper will certainly become an important reference for those interested in basic and applied studies of these habitat types. Problems such as those arising from future climate change or the conversion of natural vegetation for production purposes will affect the forest-steppe ecosystems in the future. This paper represents the perfect basis for developing new studies and planning conservation management. The Award winner was unanimously selected by the Chief Editors from a basket full of very good papers, several of which were nominated by the Co-ordinating Editors as Award candidates. Here, we mention two runner-ups. One is the paper by Foster et al. (2018) addressing the effects of fire regimes on plant species richness and composition across vegetation types in south-eastern Australia, an area where ecosystems are largely dependent on fire. By using a large data set on 87 sites and 55 years of fire history records, these authors found that fires have different effects on floristically similar plant communities, depending on their structural features. As a consequence, the management of fire regimes should take into account vegetation types. This study clearly demonstrates how vegetation science can contribute to direct land management policies aiming to maximise the conservation of natural resources. The second runner-up paper is that by Boscutti, Sigura, De Simone, and Marini (2018) testing the effects of dispersal mode and disturbance intensity on the invasion by alien plants in the agricultural landscapes of northeastern Italy. The authors used a multi-model inference approach to explore the effects of agricultural and disturbance factors on native and alien species richness and to test the role of dispersal mode. This paper demonstrates how the spread of exotic species in semi-natural habitats has been driven by the agricultural disturbance at the landscape scale and identified semi-natural habitats that are most susceptible to invasions by alien species. Invasion by alien species is a growing problem, which largely results from increased accessibility to new source pools of species (Seebens et al., 2018) and from land use changes (Guido, Vélez-Martin, Overbeck, & Pillar, 2016). Therefore, understanding the patterns and scales of community invasions and processes that contribute to resistance to invasions is important for ecosystem management. Vegetation science again demonstrates here its role in understanding such processes. As in any other vital community of scientists, our society and journals are also trying to promote scientific progress, interactions among scientists, and public outreach of our results. For the promotion and quick discussion of scientific knowledge, we have launched a blog of our journals, available at https://jvsavsblog.org/, which can be used by the authors of accepted papers to post a summary of the paper, present easily understandable text about their research, video summaries, or even narrate stories about their work on the paper. Incidentally, the first blog post was contributed by László Erdős about their award-winning paper. However, the blog is also a platform for editorial news. Each blog post can be disseminated through social media such as Facebook or Twitter. David Zelený, an Associate Editor of the Journal of Vegetation Science, developed the original idea, prepared the web platform, and made the system operational. David, together with Viktoria Wagner (Editorial Board member of Applied Vegetation Science) and Peter Minchin (Chair of the IAVS Publications Committee) are now acting as blog editors. We invite all the authors of papers accepted in Applied Vegetation Science to share and discuss the most exciting parts of their work on the blog. Finally, the community of vegetation scientists is constantly stimulated by the annual symposia of the International Association for Vegetation Science. Each year we meet in different parts of the world, present new research outcomes and discuss various topics in vegetation science. In 2018, we met in Bozeman, Montana, while this year we are returning to Europe, to Bremen, Germany, where we look forward to meeting the members of the association and the authors of papers recently published in our journals who may have never attended the IAVS symposia before. Let's meet in Bremen, a place known for the “Town Musicians of Bremen”, which is going to be the town of vegetation science this year.