title: Massive and distinctive effects of meadow voles on grassland vegetation.
abstract: We ask whether vole herbivory in experimental grassland plots is sufficient to create an unpalatable community. In a six-year experiment, meadow voles (Microtus pennsylvanicus) reduced plant standing crop between 30% and 72%, well within the range of ungulate effects. Moreover, meadow voles reduced their available forage species by changing the plant community composition: four grass species and a legume upon which they foraged declined sharply in cover and/or number of individuals, five forbs avoided by voles increased, and two forbs neither declined nor increased with either measure. Reductions of diversity occurred when voles first defoliated the plots in 2000 but disappeared as plant species avoided by voles replaced vulnerable plants. Within six years, meadow voles created plant communities dominated by species that they did not eat.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences (MIC 066) University of Illinois, 845 West Taylor Street, Chicago, Illinois 60607, USA. hfhowe@uic.edu
authors.forename: Henry F
authors.initials: HF
authors.lastname: Howe
authors.forename: Barbara
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zorn-Arnold
authors.forename: Amy
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sullivan
authors.forename: Joel S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Brown
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003411:Arvicolinae; D018533:Biomass; D017753:Ecosystem; D005518:Food Preferences; D006109:Poaceae