Seed bank research in Central-European grasslands - An overview

Kiss, Réka and Valkó, Orsolya and Tóthmérész, Béla and Török, Péter (2016) Seed bank research in Central-European grasslands - An overview. In: Seed Banks: Types, Roles and Research. Nova Science Publisher, pp. 1-34. ISBN 978- 1-536 10-388-5

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Abstract

Seed banks represent an important, but large ly undiscovered and underapprec iated component of grass land vegetation dynamics. Given its importance, our aim was to provide a comprehensive overview about the current study of seed banks in Central-European grasslands by a literature review. We found in total 32 stud ies about seed banks of CentralEuropean grasslands, with a majority of studies originating from Poland, Germany and Hungary. Most studies used the seedling emergence method in seed bank analyses. Disturbed grasslands contained a higher seed density and higher number of persistent species than undisturbed ones. The si milarity between the species composition of aboveground vegetat ion and seed banks was genera lly low to medium, but in some cases high similarity was also found (Sorensen simi larity between 0. 13- 0.75). In disturbed grasslands not only the seed density and species richness, but also the similarity with aboveground vegetation was higher than in undisturbed ones. Studies noted an increase in seed density and species richness in the course of succession and also noted the highest val ues al the end of the so-called mid-successional siage. Studies agreed that seed bank alone is not enough for habitat restorat ion so interventions and continuous management is necessary for successfu l restoration. The seed bank contained seeds of annuals and short-lived spec ies, but the characteristic grass land specialists generally lacked from the seed bank, thus there is a need for the ir active introduct ion in most cases.

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