Community dynamics of lignicolous lichens on standing deadwood in a 275-year chronosequence

Dead trees provide discrete habitat patches in which patch quality changes gradually due to wood decomposition. Although in most cases these patches persist for not more than a few decades, in some ecosystems deadwood decomposition and the consequent change in habitat patch quality can be a centuries-long process, potentially leading to dynamics of deadwood-associated communities taking place over a similar time scale. We studied the dynamics of lignicolous lichen communities on snags in near-natural European boreal forests. We surveyed lichens on 331 Pinus sylvestris snags and obtained their year of death with dendrochronological methods. The snags comprised a chronosequence of 275 years in time since tree death. Most lichen species (86 %) displayed an association with either fresh, intermediate or long-standing snags, with only few species occurring at a similar rate throughout the chronosequence. Thus, the habitat patches provided by snags were indicated to be characterized by a sequ..., , # Community dynamics of lignicolous lichens on standing deadwood in a 275-year chronosequence

Dataset DOI: [10.5061/dryad.5tb2rbpjb](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.5tb2rbpjb)

## Description of the data and file structure

This file contains lignicolous lichen community data from 331 snags (standing dead trees) that were located in three near-natural forest landscapes in Finland. 

The surveyed snags were located in 94 plots of 0.28 ha, and they represent a randomized sample of the decorticated snags of the plots.

The year of death of the trees was estimated with dendrochronological crossdating. All lichens were surveyed on the lowest two meters of the snags.
### Files and variables

#### File: SnagLichens_Data.xlsx

**Description:** Presence-absence community data of lichens on the surveyed snags. Each row corresponds to one surveyed snag.

##### Variables

* Landscape: The study landscape the tree was located in (Kuusamo/Lieksa/Salamanperä)
* TreeSpComp: The tree species composition ...,