Diversity | |
Living |
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Rebecca W. Dolan2  Jessica D. Stephens1  | |
[1] Department of Plant Biology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA; E-Mail:;Friesner Herbarium, Butler University, 4600 Sunset Ave., Indianapolis, IN 46208, USA; E-Mail: | |
关键词: biodiversity; biological invasions; urban ecology; urban conservation; urban flora; American Midwest; conservation coefficients; | |
DOI : 10.3390/d3040611 | |
来源: mdpi | |
【 摘 要 】
Urban environments pose special challenges to flora, including altered disturbance regimes, habitat fragmentation, and increased opportunity for invasion by non-native species. In addition, urban natural area represents most people's contact with nature, given the majority of the world's population currently live in cities. We used coefficients of conservatism (C-values), a system that ranks species based on perceived fidelity to remnant native plant communities that retain ecological integrity, to quantify habitat quality of 14 sites covering 850 ha within the city of Indianapolis, Indiana, in the Midwestern United States. All sites contained significant natural area and were inventoried via intensive complete censuses throughout one or two growing seasons within the last 15 years. Mean C-values for five sites were high, especially when compared to values reported for the highest quality preserves in central Indiana. However, for most sites the difference in mean C-value with and without non-natives was rather high, meaning that natural quality is likely to have been compromised by the presence of non-natives. Sites receiving the highest levels of stewardship and those with the least public access
【 授权许可】
CC BY
© 2011 by the authors; licensee MDPI; Basel; Switzerland.
【 预 览 】
Files | Size | Format | View |
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RO202003190047855ZK.pdf | 967KB | download |