Fire does not facilitate invasion by alien annual grasses in an infertile Australian agricultural landscape

Abstract

Plant invasions are a significant threat to fragmented native plant communities in many agricultural regions. Fire potentially facilitates invasions, but in landscapes historically subject to recurrent fires, exclusion of fire is also likely to result in loss of biodiversity. We investigated the relationship between fire, fragmentation and alien plant invasion in mallee communities of the Western Australian wheatbelt. We hypothesized that invasion is limited by lack of propagules and the low soil nutrient levels of this old, infertile landscape, but that fire and/or fragmentation disrupt these limits. We tested the effects of three factors on establishment and abundance of alien annuals: ± fire, ± post-fire seeding with the locally invasive Avena barbata (propagule availability) and three landscape contexts. The three landscape contexts, exploring site limitations, were reserve interiors, perimeter edges adjacent to agricultural land and internal reserve roadside edges. Our first hypothesis was supported: Avena establishment was consistently greater in seeded plots, but away from perimeter edges, growth was poor. Our second hypothesis was supported only for perimeter edges: neither fire nor fragmentation by interior roads enhanced invasive plant establishment or biomass. At perimeter edges, invasive plant biomass was significantly greater. This was associated with higher propagule availability and elevated soil nutrient levels but was not enhanced by fire. We conclude that fire is unlikely to promote invasion by alien annuals in low-nutrient ecosystems such as mallee, hence is a viable disturbance strategy for biodiversity conservation away from nutrient-enriched edges.