Abstract
Bryophytes are a crucial component of Arctic terrestrial ecosystems in terms of biomass, productivity, and species numbers. The present project provides an unprecedentedly detailed approach of understanding bryophyte-herbivore relationships in the High Arctic (Svalbard). For the first time the bryophyte components of the diet of barnacle goose (Branta leucopsis) and Svalbard reindeer (Rangifer tarandus platyrhynchus), the two vertebrate herbivores in the Kongsfjorden area around Ny-Ålesund during Arctic summer, will be determined to species level by DNA sequencing from goose and reindeer droppings. DNA barcodes from three plastid markers, trnLUAA intron, rps4, and psbA-trnH spacer, of approximately 60 moss and liverwort species common in Kongsfjorden will form the reference system of potential diet species. Feeding trials, field observations of feeding behaviour, and morphological analyses of bryophyte fragments in droppings will complement the molecular approach. To infer the impact of herbivore grazing on the biodiversity of the tundra vegetation and predict the effects of increasing goose and reindeer populations, moss diversity in ungrazed exclosures will be compared with grazed control plots. Molecular species identification by DNA barcoding provides the basis to make bryophytes fully accessible to biodiversity-based studies of ecosystem functioning in Arctic environments and to monitor the responses of Arctic vegetation to climate change.
Netherlands