Predicting burrowing crab impacts on salt marsh plants

Abstract

Burrowing animals profoundly influence plant communities, and changes in the burrower and plant communities together with changing abiotic parameters can shift the influence of burrowers on plants. However, we lack an ability to predict when, where, and how burrowers will influence vegetation. To begin to understand how naturally, varying environmental conditions influence the impacts of burrowers, we need to examine how burrower impacts on marsh plants differ across sites differing in environmental conditions. We manipulated crab presence for multiple years and measured the responses of the dominant plants, Pacific cordgrass (Spartina foliosa) and perennial pickleweed (Sarcocornia pacifica), at three sites in northern California and two sites in southern California. Southern California (Point Conception, CA, to the U.S.–Mexico border) experiences higher air and water temperatures, lower precipitation, and higher porewater salinity levels. Combining data from these field studies with laboratory studies allowed us to generate predictions about burrowing crab effects in salt marshes. Our models included (1) an estimate of grazing pressure on marsh plants by the dominant burrowing crab (Pachygrapsus crassipes) and (2) several soil biogeochemical measurements. Crab effects varied from strongly positive to strongly negative and depended upon estimated crab grazing pressure and edaphic conditions (salinity, ammonium, and nitrate). Relative to crabs at other sites, crabs enhanced cordgrass at sites with intermediate levels of ammonium and extreme salinities. The dependence of crab effects on edaphic conditions suggests that projected interannual variability in temperature, precipitation, and nutrients could lead to more temporally variable impacts of crabs on cordgrass. Understanding the environmental controls on these interactions will help promote cordgrass productivity and stabilize salt marsh ecosystems.