Margaret M. Moore, Ph.D. - Professor
Research Interests
Plant community ecology
Vegetation Change in Southwestern Plant Communities
We study changes in southwestern plant communities since Euro-American settlement.
In particular, we quantify changes in: 1) tree structural characteristics (such
as age, density, and diameter distributions), species composition, and spatial pattern;
and 2) changes in production, composition, and diversity of herbaceous plants and
shrubs associated with 3) changing disturbance regimes (specifically fire, livestock
grazing, and timber harvest) over the past 100+ years. The vegetation types we focus
on are ponderosa pine, lower mixed conifer, montane and subalpine grasslands, and
montane riparian areas. All of these vegetation types were affected by a number
of factors that occurred almost simultaneously with Euro-American settlement including
climate changes, livestock overgrazing, fire exclusion and suppression, logging,
and road building. The combined effects of changing climate and rapid changes in
disturbance regimes at the turn of the 20th c. disrupted the natural disturbance-recovery
cycles and have implications for long-term alteration in community states across
the Southwest.
We use a variety of tools to examine vegetation change in these systems, including
direct measurements of age, structure, composition, and spatial pattern on a set
of long-term permanent plots (established and mapped between 1909-1915), as well
as dendrochronological techniques for tree and stand reconstruction. We use spatial
statistics and GIS to examine the fine grain, patch-level changes over time. More
recently, we added structural equation modeling to our toolbox, a technique that
provides an analytical framework for dealing with the complexity and relative importance
of factors affecting community structure, diversity and composition. Recognizing
how the natural and anthropogenic disturbances shaped today's southwestern plant
communities provides a critical baseline (natural range of variability concept)
for management and potential restoration efforts.
Education
B.A., Valley City State University, 1980
M.S., North Dakota State University, 1982
Ph.D., University of Minnesota, 1987
Contact Information
Office: Building 82 - Room 235
Phone: 928.523.7457
Email: Margaret.Moore@nau.edu