Print PageAfter abandonment, livestock corrals in East African savannas develop into nutrient-rich, treeless “glades” that persist for decades. Other research has shown that glades have significantly higher concentrations of soil nutrients including nitrogen, potassium and carbon, which attract several specialist grass species, making these patches long-term primary productivity hotspots. Using extensive sampling, and experimental manipulations, we demonstrate that these effects on primary productivity cascade up two trophic levels to increase abundance of insects and the arboreal, insectivorous gecko Lygodactylus keniensis.
Results/Conclusions
We found that Acacia drepanolobium trees close to glade edges are larger on average and grow faster than those farther from the glade. Furthermore, we showed that grasshoppers grow significantly faster inside glades than far away from glade edges and that arboreal insect abundance, biomass and diversity show the same significant trend. Finally, we find that geckos are more abundant in trees close to the glade edge than far away. Our results show that these traditional pastoral methods have significant positive impacts on the abundance of species across multiple trophic levels and add important habitat heterogeneity to an otherwise homogenous landscape.
