A large-scale forest fragmentation experiment: The stability of altered forest ecosystems project

• Autor(a) principal: Ewers, Robert M.
• Data de Publicação: 2011
• Outros Autores: Didham, Raphael K., Fahrig, Lenore, Ferraz, Gonçalo, Hector, Andy, Holt, Robert D., Kapos, Valerie, Reynolds, Glen, Sinun, Waidi, Snaddon, Jake L., Turner, Edgar C.
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Institucional do INPA
• DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2011.0049
• Texto Completo: https://repositorio.inpa.gov.br/handle/1/16226
• topic: Deforestation; Forest Cover; Forest Ecosystem; Habitat Conservation; Habitat Corridor; Habitat Fragmentation; Hierarchical System; Sampling; Savanna; Stabilization; Borneo; East Malaysia; Malaysia; Sabah

Opportunities to conduct large-scale field experiments are rare, but provide a unique opportunity to reveal the complex processes that operate within natural ecosystems. Here, we review the design of existing, large-scale forest fragmentation experiments. Based on this review, we develop a design for the Stability of Altered Forest Ecosystems (SAFE) Project, a new forest fragmentation experiment to be located in the lowland tropical forests of Borneo (Sabah,Malaysia). The SAFE Project represents an advance on existing experiments in that it: (i) allows discrimination of the effects of landscape-level forest cover from patch-level processes; (ii) is designed to facilitate the unification of a wide range of data types on ecological patterns and processes that operate over a wide range of spatial scales; (iii) has greater replication than existing experiments; (iv) incorporates an experimental manipulation of riparian corridors; and (v) embeds the experimentally fragmented landscape within a wider gradient of land-use intensity than do existing projects. The SAFE Project represents an opportunity for ecologists across disciplines to participate in a large initiative designed to generate a broad understanding of the ecological impacts of tropical forest modification. © 2011 The Royal Society.