Abstract
Pulses, or irregular resource increases, and disturbances, or removal
and reorganization of matter, have usually been used to explain
different ecosystem level attributes, although with differing abilities
to generate accurate predictions. There is clear overlap between the
phe-nomena that the two concepts describe. Jentsch & White (2019)
introduce the concept of the “pulse-disturbance”. Both resource pulses
and disturbances can be characterized as events that transform, augment,
or reduce resources, nutrients, or biomass properties, along multiple
dimensions. These dimensions can be measured with a range of variables
repre-senting ecological processes or biodiversity outcomes. Any given
multi-dimensional pulse-disturbance event may act as a disturbance
(decreases in some variable values) and simulta-neously as a pulse
(increases in other variable values). Although the pulse-disturbance
con-cept is insightful, alone it does not generate falsifiable
predictions about outcomes. Draw-ing on the pulse-disturbance concept I
present a framework for predicting the impacts of pulse-disturbance
combinations by relating them to the concept of the microhabitat.
Micro-habitats explain fine-scale spatial patterning, biodiversity, and
are better than macroecologi-cal variables at explaining niche
coexistence. The establishment microhabitat is particularly good at
predicting adult plant distributions. I note that there is a similarity
between the mul-ti-dimensional concept of the pulse-disturbance and the
multi-dimensional description of microhabitats. I propose that
pulse-disturbances can create, and correspond to, microhabi-tats, or
overlap completely or partially with microhabitat requirements. Thus, a
predictable aspect of pulse-disturbances is the correspondence between
the microhabitats they produce, and the establishment microhabitat
requirements of species in the available pool. I propose to focus on the
prediction of indicator species, given that data on species’
establishment microhabitat requirements are not always available in
databases. To illustrate the approach, I present two case studies of
predicting plant community responses to novel or reintroduced
pulse-disturbances from central Chile.