Figure 1.
Location of trapping grids on Cravens Peak Reserve and Carlo Station.
Trapping grids (not to scale), artificial watering points and the boundary fence between the two properties, are shown. Increasing historical grazing intensity from west to east is indicated by the arrow at the bottom. The inset shows the location of the Simpson Desert within Australia. NT = Northern Territory, QLD = Queensland.
Figure 2.
Percentage cover (mean ± SE) of the herb Ptilotus polystachyus and the grass Aristida contorta.
Cover is averaged per plot, in sites with different historic grazing intensities (‘light’ and ‘heavy’) and recent cattle removal (‘+ cattle’ and ‘− cattle’) in the Simpson Desert, central Australia, in May 2007, September 2007, April 2008 and October 2008. Prior to heavy rains in early 2007 there was no coverage of either P. polystachyus or A. contorta; hence, data from these periods are not shown.
Table 1.
Summary of repeated measures ANOVA results on the effects of grazing history and cattle removal on the abundance of vegetation.
Figure 3.
nMDS ordination plots showing differences in vegetation species assemblages under different grazing regimes.
a) 3 months, b) 6 months, c) 13 months and d) 19 months after above average rainfall in early 2007. Data were fourth-root transformed and a zero-adjusted Bray-Curtis similarity matrix was used. Grazing intensity is indicated by shape (‘light’ = circle, ‘heavy’ = triangle) and grazing treatment is represented by fill shading (‘+ cattle’ = open, white), ‘− cattle’ = closed, black). For each of the four treatment groups there were three vegetation samples taken on each of the two replicate grids for a total of six samples per treatment.
Figure 4.
Captures (mean ± SE) of all vertebrates under different grazing histories and cattle removal treatments.
Captures are averaged per gridnight and historic grazing intensities are ‘light’ and ‘heavy’ and cattle removal treatments are ‘+ cattle’ and ‘− cattle’. Only the trips from 2007 on, that is trips when balanced data sets were obtained (May 2007, September 2007, April 2008, June 2008 and October 2008), are used in the statistical analyses, but trips prior to 2007 are presented to give an overview of temporal trends. Arrows indicate heavy rainfall.
Figure 5.
Captures (mean ± SE) of vertebrate groups under different grazing histories and cattle removal treatments.
Captures are averaged per gridnight, vertebrate groups are rodents, dasyurids, agamids and skinks, historic grazing intensities are ‘light’ and ‘heavy’ and cattle removal treatments are ‘+ cattle’ and ‘− cattle’. Only the trips from 2007 on, that is trips when balanced data sets were obtained (May 2007, September 2007, April 2008, June 2008 and October 2008), are used in the statistical analyses, but trips prior to 2007 are presented to give an overview of temporal trends. Arrows indicate heavy rainfall.
Table 2.
Summary of repeated measures ANOVA results on the effects of grazing history and cattle removal on the abundance of small vertebrates.
Table 3.
Total captures of small mammals under different grazing histories and cattle removal treatments.