Mountain plants unable to withstand onslaught from invasive species

ScienceDaily (Jan. 21, 2010) — An international research team has studied the distribution of plant species in mountainous environments. The study shows that mountain plant communities are not particularly resistant to invasion by exotic species. The scientists also warn that these may become more aggressive as global warming gets a grip. In 2005, scientists from various science centres in Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Australia, the United States and Chile created the Mountain Invasion Research Unit (MIREN) in order to study the distribution of exotic species in high mountain species and to design experiments to confirm the invasive capacity of certain species in high mountain environments. “These plant communities in Alpine environments have until now not been thought particularly vulnerable to this kind of environmental disturbance,” José Ramón Arévalo, one of the authors of the study and a researcher at the Department of Ecology of the University of La Laguna, said. However, the experiments show clearly “that the beliefs about this supposed protection and mountain species’ resistance to invasive species is erroneous,” he adds. The study, published recently in Frontiers in Ecology and The Environment, and which is part of the work done by MIREN, has made it possible to identify the factors that make plants in these areas more vulnerable to invasion by other species. …