Abstract
Many orchids are currently red-listed due to changes in land use, and their future persistence will depend on management. At present, the lack of data connecting their complex life cycle limits our understanding of orchid population dynamics in general, and of the effects of management in particular. In this project I will combine ongoing long-term demographic monitoring with new field experiments to gain a comprehensive understanding of the factors governing population viability in three orchid species that differ in current conservation status; Gymnadenia conopsea, Nigritella nigra and Dactylorhiza lapponica. The project will (1) evaluate how management affects orchid population viability, (2) evaluate climatic drivers of population dynamics and model potential consequences of climate change, (3) close the knowledge-gap on recruitment in the orchid life cycle, (4) integrate the effects of pollen limitation and inbreeding across the orchid life history, and (5) test for local adaptation at several spatial scales. The project represents a first assessment of the integrated effects of several processes associated with land use changes in orchid populations, and will significantly improve our basic understanding of orchid population dynamics. The results will be useful for developing guidelines for orchid conservation in general, and will have direct applied value in terms of targeted management for the studied species.
Sweden