1. Chrisoula Karakosta Laboratory of Rangeland Ecology Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece Mini Project Course: Restoration Summer School 2009 PhD theme : “Patterns of secondary succession in old fields of Northern Greece”

2. Introduction Problem Land use abandonment (agriculture) ResultVegetation evolution through secondary succession Study area: Taxiarxis-Xalkidiki, Greece Research aim : To study mechanisms of vegetation succession on abandoned fields

3. The main questions of the research are: i)Which factors control the succession pattern, ii) Which development model describes better this successional pattern and outline, iii) How do life form and species richness change along successional gradient, iv) Which are the effects of land use change on plant functional traits (PFTs).

4. Methods – Data -Old fields representing a gradient of land use abandonment (1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000, and 2007) -Vegetation sampling (spring-summer) -Soil samples (autumn) -Topographic, geological and climatic data -Trait data measurements (spring-summer)

5. Methods – Data Vegetation data 1.species composition ( point method ) 2.species cover ( point method ) 3.biodiversity indices ( quadrat ) 4.aboveground biomass ( harvesting ) -sorted out current years and old growth components

6. Soil data (depth: 2 lever 0-5cm and 5-20cm) Methods – Data 1.N, P, K, Ca, Mg concentration 2.pH, organic matter 3.texture Topographic data 1.Altitude 2.Aspect 3.slope Geological data derived from a geological maps Climatic data Collected from meteorological station

7. SLA=Specific leaf area LDMC=Leaf dry matter content LNC=Leaf nitrogen concentration LPC=Leaf phosphorus concentration LCC-Leaf carbon concentration Stem traits: StDMC=Stem dry matter content Measurements on: the dominant species in each old field Leaf traits: Methods – Data TRAIT MEASUREMENTS

8. Pending -Laboratory work Chemical analysis -Data analysis Data collection for species traits from bibliography (life forms, life cycle, Pollination mode, dispersal mode, Clonality, etc.) - Statistical analysis

9. Thank you for your attention !!!