Comparing the effects of livestock and native herbivores on plant production and vegetation composition in the Trans-Himalayas

Pastoralism

Research, Policy and Practice

Table 1 Alternative explanations for observed negative co-variation between grazer effects on plant communities and plant production

Scenario	Explanation	Description	Test
A	Biogeography	Merging data across ecosystems can lead to false patterns	Does the pattern occur within an ecosystem
B	Inconsistent parameters	Studies reporting effects on plant biomass and production are pooled together	Compare patterns of biomass against those of production
		Studies reporting changes in relative abundance and species occurrence are pooled together	Compare patterns in the Bray-Curtis index against the Sørensen index
C	Autocorrelation	Each response is independently related to a gradient of precipitation	Assess autocorrelation with soil moisture
D	Species richness	Local variation in species richness determines the strength of each response	Evaluate partial correlation

Alternative scenarios (A to D) are listed alongside a description of their underlying arguments and the analytical tests to evaluate them.