Plant community recovery 30 years after disturbance on a test oil well, arctic Alaska
Komarkova V. 1983. Plant community recovery 30 years after disturbance on a test oil well, arctic Alaska. Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America. 64(2):81
Recovered vegetation was analyzed at the site of a 1949 test oil well on the Arctic Coastal Plain, Alaska. The approximately thirty plant communities which developed during the thirty years since the disturbance were all successional and showed significantly different composition from communities growing in equivalent habitats in surrounding tundra undisturbed by humans. Numerical analysis showed that the highest degree of similarity existed between the undisturbed and recovering marsh communities and the lowest degree of similarity between the undisturbed and recovering vegetation of mesic uplands. DECO RAN A ordination showed disturbance, moisture and duration of snow cover as the principal gradients controlling the vegetation composition. It is hypothesized that on the Alaskan Arctic Slope, the environmental conditions resulting after a human surface disturbance are considerably more similar to the undisturbed conditions in habitats controlled by a strong environmental stress factor such as excess moisture than in average, zonal habitats which are primarily controlled by the local climate.
- Type
- Journal Article
- Authors
- Komarkova, V
- Units
- BELA , CAKR , GAAR , NOAT
- Keywords
- Arctic, Disturbance, Impacts, Oil, Plant Communities (Vegetation), Vegetation