Mary Awarded NSF Career Grant!

Mary was awarded a NSF career grant to support her urban ecology project in Cleveland. This is very exciting for a ALE Lab, and it is a wonderful opportunity.

Project Description:

The consequences of global biodiversity decline have fueled rapid growth in biodiversity-ecosystem function (BEF) research. On average, a positive association among species richness (the number of species in a given area) and productivity has emerged from these experiments. However, studies examining predators indicate larger variation in richness-resource (such as prey) capture relationships. Across trophic levels, resource partitioning is considered a dominant mechanism mediating BEF patterns. Yet, for predators there is little empirical evidence that resource partitioning facilitates species richness and leads to enhanced resource capture. Without greater knowledge of the mechanisms driving predator BEF relationships, conservation of predators and their functions is difficult to achieve. Studying these processes is also challenging. Many logistical hurdles exist in documenting partitioning among predators, particularly in real-world heterogeneous landscapes. Nevertheless, discerning the effects of spatial pattern on the mechanisms and outcomes of BEF relationships will greatly advance ecosystem ecology and inform conservation.

This NSF grant will establish a large-scale field experiment to examine how the surrounding landscape influences predator resource partitioning and resource capture. 

Objective 1 tests the hypothesis that spatial heterogeneity (a mix of different land uses) facilitates resource partitioning. This objective will document how patch and landscape heterogeneity affect the dietary niche (ecological role of the organisms regarding food consumption, or in simpler terms...what do these predators eat?) overlap of five generalist predator species, as a measure of resource partitioning. The goal of this objective will be to determine if the extent of niche overlap present among this indicator community is a significant predictor of predator species richness, abundance, and resource capture. Heterogeneity-resource partitioning relationships could affect resource capture via several mechanisms. 

Objective 2 will test whether changes in heterogeneity affect resource capture via: random gain/loss in species richness, non-random gain/loss of highly effective predatory species, and/or altering the per-capita contributions of species. This objective utilizes the Extended Price Equation Partition to calculate how each of these mechanisms independently changes in response to altered patch and/or landscape heterogeneity. To inform conservation and management, it’s important to understand how these changes affect the provision of ecosystem services. 

Objective 3 will track the dispersal of predators among patches within a landscape to determine if heterogeneity affects the ability of a patch to serve as a source of biological control services.

The city of Cleveland, OH will serve as a model system to test relationships between predator richness, abundance, and function. Cleveland contains over 10,000 vacant city lots. Decisions regarding vacant land management will shape the ecological and social quality of inner-city neighborhoods for decades to come. Therefore, understanding how the composition of these habitats and their landscape context influence BEF relationships is a critical task facing ecologists. This research will take place within a network of 64 vacant lot sites assigned to one of eight plant community treatments. These treatments represent a range of available options for vacant land management and were selected through a partnership with the Cleveland City Planning Commission. The outcomes of this research will inform future green space design in Cleveland and other cities engaged or interested in vacant land management.

Objective 4: Additionally, this proposal creates significant opportunities for high school students within Cleveland and throughout the state of Ohio to conduct field ecology research by establishing the Ohio Ecological Research School Sites . This network of Environmental Science classrooms will study arthropod predator-prey relationships by conducting an experiment entitled The Prey Buffet. 

Objective 5 will also provide internships to talented Cleveland high school students to gain direct research experience in my laboratory. This program will provide experience in proposal writing and experimental design, field data collection, data analysis, and presentation of findings.         

Finally, the growth of crop production on vacant land provides important health benefits to inner-city communities lacking access to fresh produce.
Objective 6 will create the Sustainable Urban Food Production Program to address the need for urban gardener and farmer training. This OSU Master Gardener specialization program will produce a network of trained volunteers who will develop and present programs within urban communities focused on sustainable gardening and farming practices.

Congratulations Mary!