Biological soil crusts in a xeric Florida shrubland: composition, abundance, and spatial heterogeneity of crusts with different disturbance histories

Biological soil crusts consisting of algae, cyanobacteria, lichens, fungi, bacteria, and mosses are common in habitats where water and nutrients are limited and vascular plant cover is discontinuous. Crusts alter soil factors including water availability, nutrient content, and erosion susceptibility, and thus are likely to both directly and indirectly affect plants. To establish this link, we must first understand the crust landscape. We described the composition, abundance, and distribution of microalgae in crusts from a periodically burned, xeric Florida shrubland, with the goal of understanding the underlying variability they create for vascular plants, as well as the scale of that variability. This is the first comprehensive study of crusts in the southeastern United States, where the climate is mesic but sandy soils create xeric conditions. We found that crusts were both temporally and spatially heterogeneous in depth and species composition. For example, cyanobacteria and algae increased in abundance 10-15 years after fire and away from dominant shrubs. Chlorophyll a levels recovered rapidly from small-scale disturbance relative to intact crusts, but these disturbances added to crust patchiness. Plants less than 1 m apart can experience different crust environments that may alter plant fitness, plant interactions, and plant community composition.