DOI: 10.5061/dryad.62t8442
title: Data from: Concordance in wetland physicochemical conditions, vegetation, and surrounding land cover is robust to data extraction approach

description: Concordance among wetland physicochemical conditions, vegetation, and
 surrounding land cover may result from the influence of land cover on the
 sources of plant propagules, on physicochemical conditions, and their
 subsequent determination of growing conditions. Alternatively, concordance
 may result if differences in climate, soils, and species pools are
 spatially confounded with differences in human population density and land
 conversion. Further, we expect that land cover within catchment boundaries
 will be more predictive than land cover in symmetrical buffers if runoff
 is a major pathway. We measured concordance between land cover, wetland
 vegetation and physicochemical conditions in 48 prairie pothole wetlands,
 controlling for inter-wetland distance. We contrasted land-cover data
 collected over a four-year period by multiple extraction approaches
 including topographically-delineated catchments and nested 30 m to 5,000 m
 radius buffers. After factoring out inter-wetland distance, physiochemical
 conditions were significantly concordant with land cover. Vegetation was
 not significantly concordant with land cover, though it was strongly and
 significantly concordant with physicochemical conditions. More,
 concordance was as strong when land cover was extracted from buffers
 &lt;500 m in radius as from catchments, indicating the mechanism
 responsible is not topographically constrained. We conclude that local
 landscape structure does not directly influence wetland vegetation
 composition, but rather that vegetation depends on physicochemical
 conditions in the wetland (which are affected by surrounding land cover)
 and on regional factors such as the vegetation species pool and geographic
 gradients in climate, soil type, and land use.
description: land_cover_data_40datasetsTotal of 40 datasets, representing 40 combinations of land cover data around study wetlands measured in 4 years of land cover data x 10 spatial extents used to extract land cover data. Contains the following .csv files: land_cover_data_10mDEM_catchment_2011 land_cover_data_10mDEM_catchment_2012 land_cover_data_10mDEM_catchment_2013 land_cover_data_10mDEM_catchment_2014 land_cover_data_25mDEM_catchment_2011 land_cover_data_25mDEM_catchment_2012 land_cover_data_25mDEM_catchment_2013 land_cover_data_25mDEM_catchment_2014 land_cover_data_30m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_30m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_30m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_30m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_100m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_100m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_100m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_100m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_200m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_200m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_200m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_200m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_300m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_300m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_300m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_300m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_500m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_500m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_500m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_500m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_1000m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_1000m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_1000m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_1000m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_2000m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_2000m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_2000m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_2000m_buffer_2014 land_cover_data_5000m_buffer_2011 land_cover_data_5000m_buffer_2012 land_cover_data_5000m_buffer_2013 land_cover_data_5000m_buffer_2014wetland_environmental_data_45variables_processed45 water and soil characteristics of study wetlands, including variables reflecting hydrology, nutrients, ionic chemistry, fertility, soil physical properties, and pesticide presence.wetland_vegetation_data_124species_processedComposition and abundance data of 124 plant vascular plant species within study wetlands.wetland_geographic_coordinates_48sitesGeographic coordinates of 48 wetlands within the Alberta Grassland and Parkland natural regions.