Riparian alder ecosystems as epiphytic lichen refugia in sub-boreal spruce forests of British Columbia
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Alder-dominated riparian forests represent only a small proportion of the landscape in central-interior British Columbia. However, they possess a suite of attributes that may allow them to function as refugia for canopy macrolichens. These include their deciduous habitat, their location in moist nutrient receiving sites, and their distribution as narrow corridors that cross broad regional landscapes. We have examined their potential role as lichen refugia by assessing canopy macrolichen communities in 75 riparian alder forests across a 200 km longitudinal gradient in central-interior British Columbia. Study sites were stratified equally between three climate subzones of the Sub-Boreal Spruce biogeoclimatic zone. Forty-nine macrolichen taxa were observed, including the old-growth indicator cyanolichen species Lobaria scrobiculata (Scop.) DC., L. retigera (Bory) Trevisan, Nephroma isidiosum (Nyl.) Gyelnik, and Sticta limbata (Sm.) Ach. Canonical correspondence analysis identified mean annual temperature, mean annual precipitation, age of adjacent conifer forest, and abundance of large stems (dbh >10 cm) as significant explanatory variables. Regional precipitation gradients explained the exclusion of many lichen species from both the most westerly and most easterly riparian forests, with drier summer conditions and heavy winter snowpack, respectively, being major limiting factors. Lichens preferentially occupied large leaning stems, which may provide greater precipitation interception and continuity of substrate, when compared with smaller upright alder stems. We conclude that alder-dominated riparian forests represent a major refugium for old-growth dependent lichens in British Columbia’s sub-boreal spruce landscapes and as such may provide valuable dispersal corridors between remnant old-growth coniferous forest patches.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".