Reintroducing grazing reshapes grassland communities: Stronger responses in wet than dry habitats
7 affiliations
- 1University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice, Czechia; Corresponding author.
- 2University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice, Czechia
- 3Institute of Botany Czech Academy of Sciences, Czechia
- 4Masaryk University, Czechia
- 5University of Hradec Králové, Czechia
- 6Museum of East Bohemia in Hradec Králové, Czechia
- 7Hradec Králové, Czechia
Abstract
Temperate grasslands in Europe are increasingly threatened by management abandonment, which reduces habitat heterogeneity and promotes competitive exclusion by fast-growing dominant species. Although extensive year-round grazing is widely used as a restoration tool, its short-term ecological responses across moisture gradients remain poorly understood. We used a BACI (Before–After–Control–Impact) design to investigate vegetation dynamics during the first three years following grazing introduction. Across 43 paired plots spanning a moisture gradient at 11 degraded grassland localities in the Czech Republic (i.e., rewilding reserves at the national level), we quantified shifts in species richness, species cover, and community-weighted means of selected plant traits, such as clonality index, specific leaf area (SLA), seed mass, canopy height, and flowering duration. We found that reintroducing grazing triggered a significant competitive release effect, with grazed plots gaining on average 4.8 species (17%) over three years, while ungrazed controls remained stable. This increase was primarily driven by suppression of dominant, often invasive alien and ruderal species, facilitating the recruitment of subordinate native species, with stronger responses in wet than dry habitats. However, these taxonomic changes have not yet been translated into higher Shannon diversity, indicating that newly recruited species remain at low abundance and have not substantially altered community evenness. Our findings demonstrate that grazing can redirect successional trajectories, with outcomes strongly mediated by environmental context, such as a moisture gradient.
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BibTeX
@article{janeckova2026reintroducing,
title = {{Reintroducing grazing reshapes grassland communities: Stronger responses in wet than dry habitats}},
author = {Petra Janečková and Klára Řehounková and Anna Müllerová and Lenka Šebelíková and Kamila Vítovcová and Miguel Ballesteros and Kateřina Štajerová and Marie Kotasová Adámková and Pavel Novák and Helena Chytrá and Romana Prausová and Věra Samková and Věra Hromádková and Lubomír Tichý},
journal = {Global Ecology and Conservation},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1016/j.gecco.2026.e04473},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2026.e04473},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Reintroducing grazing reshapes grassland communities: Stronger responses in wet than dry habitats
AU - Petra Janečková
AU - Klára Řehounková
AU - Anna Müllerová
AU - Lenka Šebelíková
AU - Kamila Vítovcová
AU - Miguel Ballesteros
AU - Kateřina Štajerová
AU - Marie Kotasová Adámková
AU - Pavel Novák
AU - Helena Chytrá
AU - Romana Prausová
AU - Věra Samková
AU - Věra Hromádková
AU - Lubomír Tichý
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/30
JO - Global Ecology and Conservation
DO - 10.1016/j.gecco.2026.e04473
UR - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2026.e04473
AB - Temperate grasslands in Europe are increasingly threatened by management abandonment, which reduces habitat heterogeneity and promotes competitive exclusion by fast-growing dominant species. Although extensive year-round grazing is widely used as a restoration tool, its short-term ecological responses across moisture gradients remain poorly understood. We used a BACI (Before–After–Control–Impact) design to investigate vegetation dynamics during the first three years following grazing introduction. Across 43 paired plots spanning a moisture gradient at 11 degraded grassland localities in the Czech Republic (i.e., rewilding reserves at the national level), we quantified shifts in species richness, species cover, and community-weighted means of selected plant traits, such as clonality index, specific leaf area (SLA), seed mass, canopy height, and flowering duration. We found that reintroducing grazing triggered a significant competitive release effect, with grazed plots gaining on average 4.8 species (17%) over three years, while ungrazed controls remained stable. This increase was primarily driven by suppression of dominant, often invasive alien and ruderal species, facilitating the recruitment of subordinate native species, with stronger responses in wet than dry habitats. However, these taxonomic changes have not yet been translated into higher Shannon diversity, indicating that newly recruited species remain at low abundance and have not substantially altered community evenness. Our findings demonstrate that grazing can redirect successional trajectories, with outcomes strongly mediated by environmental context, such as a moisture gradient.
SN - 2351-9894
ER -