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Adaptation to Disturbance

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Disturbance Ecology

Part of the book series: Landscape Series ((LAEC,volume 32))

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Abstract

Plants began to colonize land more than 400 million years ago. Since then, they have been exposed to fire, wind, drought, frost, floods, herbivores, and other disturbances – sometimes simultaneously – and have developed a variety of strategies to reproduce despite their exposure to these disturbances. The length of the evolutionary period available for such adaptations has been long. Accordingly, the adaptations that have been developed are complex and diverse. On the other hand, recent studies have shown that plants can also adapt very quickly to new disturbance regimes. The adaptation potentials of organisms and biotic communities available in ecosystems represent an important basis for their future development in times of global change.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Forest Ecology, Department of Forest and Soil Sciences, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences BOKU, Vienna, Austria

    Georg Gratzer

  2. Bayreuth Center of Ecology and Environmental Research (BayCEER), University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany

    Anke Jentsch

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  1. Georg Gratzer
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  2. Anke Jentsch
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Correspondence to Georg Gratzer or Georg Gratzer .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. WSL Swiss Federal Research Institute, Birmensdorf, Zürich, Switzerland

    Thomas Wohlgemuth

  2. Universität Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Bayern, Germany

    Anke Jentsch

  3. Technical University of Munich, Freising, Bayern, Germany

    Rupert Seidl

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Gratzer, G., Jentsch, A. (2022). Adaptation to Disturbance. In: Wohlgemuth, T., Jentsch, A., Seidl, R. (eds) Disturbance Ecology. Landscape Series, vol 32. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98756-5_6

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