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Characteristics of alpine plants and soils along an elevational gradient, Northern Selkirk Mountains, British Columbia
DownloadSpring 2019
Rates of climate change are accelerated at higher elevations, a pattern termed elevation-dependent warming (EDW). Consequently, the impacts of climate change on community patterning and soil development may be particularly evident in alpine environments. Alpine ecotone boundaries, such as...
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Spring 2014
The worldwide biodiversity crisis has intensified the need to better understand how biodiversity and human disturbance are related. Yet this relationship lacks both consensus in theoretical expectations and consistency in observed empirical patterns. I present one of the largest extent studies...
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Limited impacts of extensive human land use on dominance, specialization, and biotic homogenization in boreal plant communities
Download2015-01-01
Mayor, S. J., Boutin, S., He, F., Cahill, J. F.
Background Niche theory predicts that human disturbance should influence the assembly of communities, favouring functionally homogeneous communities dominated by few but widespread generalists. The decline and loss of specialists leaves communities with species that are functionally more similar....
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Spring 2013
The Rocky Mountain apollo butterfly, Parnassius smintheus, and its host-plant Sedum lanceolatum, are endemic to open alpine meadows threatened by the encroachment of trees. I explore variability in interactions between P. smintheus and S. lanceolatum relative to the treeline-delimited meadow...
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Scaling Disturbance Instead of Richness to Better Understand Anthropogenic Impacts on Biodiversity
Download2015-01-01
Mayor, S. J., Cahill, J. F., He, F., Boutin, S.
A primary impediment to understanding how species diversity and anthropogenic disturbance are related is that both diversity and disturbance can depend on the scales at which they are sampled. While the scale dependence of diversity estimation has received substantial attention, the scale...
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The impact of recreational activities on an alpine vascular plant community in the Canadian Rockies
DownloadFall 2010
Alpine tundra is notorious for its fragility and slow recovery following disturbance. Tourism is increasing in alpine areas, creating the need to improve our understanding of the impacts of recreation in these ecosystems. This study examined the impacts of hiking and off-highway vehicle use on...