Mountain Invasion Research Network (MIREN)

Project description

High mountain ecosystems remain little-invaded by non-native species, with steep declines in non-native plant richness along elevation gradients around the world. Within the external page Mountain Invasion Research Network (MIREN), we seek to understand these globally consistent patterns, thereby gaining insight into the mechanisms driving invasion dynamics more generally (e.g. propagule pressure, biotic interactions and rapid evolution) and helping to protect relatively pristine high mountain environments.

external page We showed that non-native plants reaching high elevations around the world are consistently widespread generalist species, predominantly from Europe, which can be explained by historical low-elevation introduction pathways coupled with climatic filtering as species spread upwards. We have expanded our monitoring programme to include both native and non-native plant species, using a standardized protocol that so far has been replicated in 22 mountain regions around the world to study species “redistributions” along elevation gradients. We also conduct globally-replicated experiments to better understand how invasion dynamics might be influenced by climate change.