Multistate Succession in Wetlands

Abstract

Example of an emergent slough with Crinum americanum (Southern swamp lily), Water Conservation Area 3A South in the Everglades, Florida, USA. Slough/sawgrass complex in Water Conservation Area 3A South. . Wetlands are an ecosystem with unique, nonlinear patterns of succession due to the regular, but often inconstant presence of water on the landscape. To address this, we developed general, nonspatial state and transition succession models (S and T) for wetlands, and within this framework, created succession/management models for use in restoration of the Everglades, Florida. Our study area, Water Conservation 3A South, has been impounded for over 40 years, and the resultant ponding has affected its unique vegetation community composition and patterns, particularly emergent sloughs/wet prairies and the sawgrass ridge and slough landscape. We sampled transects across community ecotones to provide baseline information and create S and T models that address the effect of hydrology on the succession of vegetation communities. Setting out to sample wetland vegetation in Water Conservation Area 3A South. These photographs illustrate the article “Multi-state succession in wetlands: a novel use of state and transition models” by Christa L. Zweig and Wiley M. Kitchens, tentatively scheduled to appear in Ecology in 2009.