Journal Article

Self-Organized Vegetation Patterning as a Fingerprint of Climate and Human Impact on Semi-Arid Ecosystems

Couteron, Pierre, Lejeune, Olivier, Barbier, Nicolas, Deblauwe, Vincent, Lejoly, Jean

2006

Overview

1 Spatially periodic vegetation patterns are well known in arid and semi-arid regions around the world. 2 Mathematical models have been developed that attribute this phenomenon to a symmetry-breaking instability. Such models are based on the interplay between competitive and facilitative influences that the vegetation exerts on its own dynamics when it is constrained by arid conditions, but evidence for these predictions is still lacking. Moreover, not all models can account for the development of regularly spaced spots of bare ground in the absence of a soil prepattern. 3 We applied Fourier analysis to high-resolution, remotely sensed data taken at either end of a 40-year interval in southern Niger. Statistical comparisons based on this textural characterization gave us broad-scale evidence that the decrease in rainfall over recent decades in the sub-Saharan Sahel has been accompanied by a detectable shift from homogeneous vegetation cover to spotted patterns marked by a spatial frequency of about$20 cycles\\;km^{-1}$. 4 Wood cutting and grazing by domestic animals have led to a much more marked transition in unprotected areas than in a protected reserve. 5 Field measurements demonstrated that the dominant spatial frequency was endogenous rather than reflecting the spatial variation of any pre-existing heterogeneity in soil properties. 6 All these results support the use of models that can account for periodic vegetation patterns without invoking substrate heterogeneity or anisotropy, and provide new elements for further developments, refinements and tests. 7 This study underlines the potential of studying vegetation pattern properties for monitoring climatic and human impacts on the extensive fragile areas bordering hot deserts. Explicit consideration of vegetation self-patterning may also improve our understanding of vegetation and climate interactions in arid areas.

• Publisher: British Ecological Society,Blackwell Publishing Ltd,Blackwell Science
• Subject: Animal and plant ecology / Animal, plant and microbial ecology / anthropogenic activities / Arid zones / aridity / Biological and medical sciences / Climate change / climate variability / cutting / deserts / domestic animals / Drought / dry environmental conditions / Ecology / ecosystem monitoring / Ecosystems / Ecosystems and Human Impacts / Fourier transform / Fourier transforms / Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology / General aspects / grazing / Human ecology / Human influences / human pressure / Human-environment relationship / Mathematical models / Niger / pattern classification / Rain / remote sensing / Sahel / Savanna soils / self‐organization / Semiarid lands / Soil ecology / soil heterogeneity / symmetry‐breaking instability / Synecology / Vegetation / Vegetation cover / Vegetation mapping / Vegetation patterns / wood