Ecosystem-wide responses to fire and large mammal herbivores in an African savanna

Fire and large mammal herbivores (LMH) are the principal top-down forces maintaining savanna structure.  Nonetheless, experiments designed to investigate interactions between fire and LMH are rare in savannas, and relationships between environmental variation and biodiversity in the context of fire and LMH are poorly understood.  This study addresses these gaps by manipulating the presence of LMH and early and late dry season fires in a tropical African savanna.  In addition, this work simultaneously explores environmental variables including soil and foliar quality, vegetation cover, and nearby water sources to more holistically describe factors affecting savanna functioning and biodiversity. 
After one year of experimental treatments, changes in vegetation were already apparent.  Shrub abundance and richness and grass richness were higher in the absence of LMH, while grass biomass increased three-fold in burned plots as compared to unburned plots.  Foliar nutrients tended to increase ..., Study site
The Gorongosa Savanna Ecology Experiment is in a Rift Valley Lowland Woodland landscape (Lötter et al., 2021) in Gorongosa National Park (GNP), Mozambique (-18°58', 34°20', ~25 m a.s.l.).  The experimental area covers ~197-ha.  Woody plant communities include a mixed broadleaf savanna dominated by Combretum adenogonium (Combretaceae) which transitions to a more open savanna co-dominated by Acacia (Vachellia) robusta and Acacia (Senegalia) nigrescens (Fabaceae).  The most common shrub is Capparis erythrocarpos var. rosea (Capparaceae), and common grasses include Megathyrsus maximus, P. infestum, P. coloratum, Urochloa mosambicensis, and Digitaria eriantha.  Soils are silty clay loams.  The average annual temperature is 24.1° C, and average annual precipitation is 1053 mm.  The area is a mesic savanna with a dry season extending from April to November; 86% of rain falls between November and March.  Between 2001 and the start of the experiment in 2020, the study area burned ever..., , •           Summary of experimental efforts underlying this dataset

The datasets included here are from the Gorongosa Savanna Ecology Experiment, a factorial experiment exploring interactions between fire (cold and hot burns and plots without fire) and large mammals (exclosure vs. open plots).  All methods are described in the uploaded methods and in the article, Ecosystem-wide responses to fire and large mammal herbivores in an African savanna, in Biotropica.

•           Description of file structure and contents

Files are Excel files.  One worksheet contains the data, organized and ready for analyses, and the second worksheet (titled ‘explanation’) describes the variables in each column of the data worksheets.

•           Definitions of all variables, abbreviations, missing data codes, and units

All descriptions are in the ‘explanation’ worksheets of the Excel files.  The only exception is the phenolics dataset in which the column names are self-explanatory.  Cells with “NA” lack...