Understory plant communities fail to recover species diversity after excluding deer for nearly 20 years

Abstract

White-tailed deer ( Odocoileus virginianus) have been overabundant in eastern North America for more than five decades, resulting in depauperate understories and ricocheting effects on higher trophic levels. Even after deer populations are reduced, understory plant communities may fail to recover for an unknown length of time due to persistent legacy effects. We surveyed understory plant communities in six deer exclosures and paired reference plots in northwestern Pennsylvania to determine the degree to which 19 years of deer exclusion was sufficient for recovery of species richness, diversity, percent cover, and understory structural complexity. We observed a 2.3-fold increase in tree cover and a 60% reduction in fern cover in the ground layer, as well as a 114-fold increase in foliage density between 80 and 200 cm above ground level, in exclosures compared to reference plots. However, the exclosures did not permanently support higher overall percent cover, species richness, or diversity in the ground layer, nor did we detect any meaningful divergence in community composition between exclosures and reference plots. We conclude that 19 years of release from chronic over-browsing are sufficient to restore understory structural complexity, but recovery of diversity in the ground layer will require more time or direct intervention.