Influence of disturbances on shrub invasion of grasslands in arid watersheds.

In this work, we investigate the role of disturbances, such as fires and grazing, on vegetation organization in arid areas characterized with aeolian sediment transport. We adapted a conceptual cellular automaton model that couples vegetation states and soil resource level from Ravi et al. (2009).

We demonstrate the application of this model in Landlab in the figure below: (a) Ecosystem response to a natural fire regime and minimal grazing: (i)&(ii) spatial map of modeled vegetation organziation at years 50 & 250 respectively; (b) Ecosystem response to a natural fire regime and intense grazing: (i)&(ii) spatial map of modeled vegetation organziation at years 50 & 250 respectively. Model predicts that shrubs will dominate under conditions of intense grazing.

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*PFT - Plant Functional Type (Tree, Shrub, or Grass)