Impacts of feral horses on a desert environment.
BACKGROUND
Free-ranging horses (Equus caballus) in North America are considered to be feral animals since they are descendents of non-native domestic horses introduced to the continent. We conducted a study in a southern California desert to understand how feral horse movements and horse feces impacted this arid ecosystem. We evaluated five parameters susceptible to horse trampling: soil strength, vegetation cover, percent of nonnative vegetation, plant species diversity, and macroinvertebrate abundance. We also tested whether or not plant cover and species diversity were affected by the presence of horse feces.


RESULTS
Horse trailing resulted in reduced vegetation cover, compacted soils, and in cases of intermediate intensity disturbance, increased plant species diversity. The presence of horse feces did not affect plant cover, but it did increase native plant diversity.


CONCLUSIONS
Adverse impacts, such as soil compaction and increased erosion potential, were limited to established horse trails. In contrast, increased native plant diversity near trails and feces could be viewed as positive outcomes. Extensive trailing can result in a surprisingly large impact area: we estimate that < 30 horses used > 25 km2 of trails in our study area.
Ostermann-Kelm
Stacey D
SD
Wildlife Health Center, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA.Stacey_ostermann-kelm@nps.gov
Atwill
Edward A
EA
Rubin
Esther S
ES
Hendrickson
Larry E
LE
Boyce
Walter M
WM
D000818:Animals; D002140:California; D003889:Desert Climate; D017753:Ecosystem; D005243:Feces / Q000737:chemistry; D006736:Horses / Q000502:physiology*; D063245:Plant Development; D012987:Soil / Q000032:analysis
D012987:Soil