Directed Research SFS 4910
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Directed Research SFS 4910 Dr. Sigrid Heise-Pavlov Associate Professor Dr. Justus Kithiia Dr. Catherine Pohlman Office hours by appointment The School for Field Studies (SFS) Centre for Rainforest Studies Queensland, Australia This syllabus may develop or change over time based on local conditions, learning opportunities, and faculty expertise. Course content may vary from semester to semester. www.fieldstudies.org © 2018 The School for Field Studies F18 Center Research Direction The Centre for Rainforest Studies’ research plan addresses the question: How can the future of the Wet Tropics in a changing world be ensured? Staff and students of SFS-CRS investigate this topic by engaging in research under three core components: 1. Understanding ecological and social systems; 2. Conflict, vulnerability and change; 3. Effective response to change. Through our research, we aim to assist a range of stakeholders and research partners. These include local landholders; non-government conservation organisations conducting rainforest restoration or having a special interest in flora and fauna; several levels of government, particularly local and state government; regional research organisations, including universities and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. We aim to improve stability, sustainability, environmental awareness, and concern for natural resources in the Wet Tropics, in particular on the Atherton Tablelands. Our goal is to strengthen research, technical and practical collaboration between SFS-CRS and other research organizations, governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations to carry out this agenda. Course Overview The aim of this course is to provide students with the opportunity to apply ecological, biological, and/or social-scientific methods to a field research project that addresses a local issue related to the environment. This course prepares students to distinguish hidden assumptions in scientific approaches. We will also investigate the ways that various methods and theories differentiate (or do not) fact from interpretation, cause from correlation, and advocacy from objectivity. Through the Directed Research projects, students will contribute to a growing body of scientific research that informs local conservation and resource management decisions and furthers the Center’s research agenda. Each student will join a faculty-led team that will carry out field research, data analysis, and communication of results in one or across several of the following disciplines: ecology, natural resource management, and social sciences. The Directed Research course is designed to build on the information students have learned in the topical courses as well as Directed Research lectures and workshops specifically designed to assist students in understanding the scientific process, testing hypotheses and presenting results in both written and spoken formats (see below for these courses). Some of the research projects being conducted this semester are still being finalized, pending discussions with collaborators and the outcomes of Scientific Purposes and ethics applications. Please be aware that the following DR topics are from the previous semester and may change in future terms based on local conditions, research permits, learning opportunities, and faculty expertise. 2 1. Project Supervisor: Catherine Pohlman Dr. Catherine Pohlman will continue research on Topic 1.4.1: Dynamic rainforest boundaries and the enigma of wet sclerophyll forests. Rainforest and savanna are considered to constitute two alternate stable ecosystem states in many tropical landscapes, with boundaries between these two states mediated by fire. Rainforest has been observed to be expanding into savanna around the tropics over the past half century, although the causes of this expansion are still hotly debated. Leading hypotheses include (1) changes in fire regime (e.g., due to the discontinuation of Indigenous burning practices, or changes in land management practices), (2) overgrazing, and (3) increasing atmospheric pCO2 providing a competitive advantage to rainforest over savanna. In Australia, an additional ecosystem type sometimes occurs between the boundaries of rainforest and savanna. Wet sclerophyll forests, also known as tall open forests, have puzzled scientists for many decades. These forests occur in a thin strip on the western edge of rainforests that extends from northeastern Queensland to the southernmost parts of Tasmania. The canopy of these forests is composed of very tall Eucalyptus species (e.g., E. grandis, E. regnans, E. obliqua, E. delegatensis, E. pilularis, E. viminalis, E. resinifera, E. pellita), while the understorey may be composed of grasses and sclerophyll shrubs, or even immature rainforest species. Scientists are divided on whether wet sclerophyll forests represent (1) the tallest and wettest variety of sclerophyll forests and woodlands (widespread flammable vegetation that dominates most of Australia), (2) the driest variety of rainforest (fire-sensitive vegetation), or (3) a transitional state between flammable sclerophyll vegetation and fire-sensitive rainforest. For this project, we will examine the vegetation structure, floristic composition and plant functional traits of (1) transects between savanna, wet sclerophyll and rainforest and (2) transects between savanna and rainforest (i.e., ecotones where wet sclerophyll vegetation does not occur) on the Atherton Tablelands. We will also attempt to reconstruct a preliminary fire history across these transects. This project falls within Component 1 of the CRS five-year research plan (Understanding social and ecological systems). We will attempt to address some of the following questions: • How are species composition and vegetation structure related to fire history? • Are all types of wet sclerophyll vegetation functionally similar? A number of different plant assemblages have been classified as “wet sclerophyll” but these assemblages are known to differ markedly in species composition and vegetation structure. Perhaps these assemblages also differ in their functional traits and ecology? • Some scientists have expressed concern that rainforest may be “colonizing” wet sclerophyll forest. Are these concerns warranted, or are we merely observing a normal part of the ecology of these forests? What are the historical patterns of rainforest colonization of wet sclerophyll forests? Are these driven by changes in fire regimes, or perhaps by increasing atmospheric CO2, or both? • Is wet sclerophyll vegetation expanding into dry sclerophyll and savannah vegetation, perhaps in a manner similar to the expansion of rainforest into wet sclerophyll? • What ecological patterns and processes are involved in the expansion of rainforest into savanna (with or without the presence of wet sclerophyll vegetation)? 3 2. Project Supervisor: Sigrid Heise-Pavlov Professor Dr. Sigrid Heise-Pavlov will offer Directed Research projects linked to the SFS-CRS Strategic Research Plan Topic 3.2: Monitoring the outcomes of Ecological Restoration Since 2016 CRS-SFS collates and maintains a database on revegetation projects on the Atherton Tablelands (Stieglitz 2016). While the database was originally GIS based, a more user-friendly database in MS Access was developed in Wet 2018 (Collins et al. 2018). This semester’s DR project will add spatial data from older revegetation sites that haven’t been included in the GIS based database, and will increase the effectiveness of the created MS Access database by linking it to information of the spatial database. Because the created databases aim at the identification of best-practice restoration principles, monitoring of the development of the sites is essential and should follow systematic methodological protocols. Results of monitoring will be part of the databases and this semester’s DRs will aim at piloting the monitoring of floristic and faunal elements of restoration sites. Although protocols for monitoring site conditions, forest structure, plant composition and bird communities are available (Kanowski et al. 2010) there is a lack of pre-defined methodologies to monitor other fauna elements on rainforest revegetation sites. However, previous DR projects of CRS investigated the compositions of various invertebrates on restoration sites (Burgio 2009; Morrison 2009; Cathcart 2009; Reynolds 2010; Myers 2010; Farr 2013). These DRs shall be a starting point for a review on methods that had previously been applied to rainforest revegetation sites to develop a tool kit that can assist in monitoring the colonization of restoration sites by invertebrates and vertebrates in a cost-and time efficient way. Outcomes of these DR projects will improve the existing databases on rainforest restoration projects of the Atherton Tablelands and will lay the baseline for the development of a systematic monitoring program of rainforest restoration sites that can be implemented through citizen science projects in future years. Results will help to demonstrate the magnitude and effects of rainforest restoration projects on the Tablelands and will therefore also strengthen CRS’s contribution to community- driven restoration work on the Tablelands. Burgio, K. (2009) Ant genera composition in differently aged restoration sites. - Directed Research CRS-SFS Cathcart, E. (2010) Assessing the suitability of revegetation sites for microchiropteran species in the Wet Tropics.- Directed Research CRS-SFS Collins, K., Hunsaker, W. and Kohlruss-Reuman, P.