Soil Seed Banks Associated with Individual Broom Snakeweed Plants

Abstract

The influence of individual broom snakeweed (Gutierrezia sarothrae [Pursh] Britt. & Rushby) plants on the distribution of buried viable seed and the distribution of plants in the field was studied in a desert grassland in southern New Mexico. Surface soil samples collected at 3 distances from a central broom snakeweed plant were watered in pots in a greenhouse and numbers of each species emerging were counted. Densities of each species were also determined in the field. Some species (Sporobolus flexuosus [Thurb.] Rybd., S. contractus Hitchc., Descurainia pinnata [Walt.] Britton, and Dithyrea wislizenii Engelm.) emerged in greatest numbers from soil collected in the zones closest and at the greatest distances from the broom snakeweed. Emergence of other species declined in relation to distance from the central snakeweed plant. In the field, grasses generally increased in relation to distance from the central broom snakeweed plant while the pattern for forbs was not consistent.