Invertebrate richness and biomass of four sites in the southern Great Plains: Pyric herbivory study

This data publication includes the number of orders and biomass of sampled aboveground invertebrates from four sites within the southern Great Plains (Oklahoma and Texas). This large-scale experiment was established to compare prescribed fire treatments without grazing to those where grazing is allowed to interact through pyric herbivory at the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve, Packsaddle Wildlife Management Area, Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, and Attwater’s Prairie-Chicken National Wildlife Refuge. The study involved sampling fire-only treatment patches of various time since fire, and fire/grazing patches with various time since fire as available. Field data, obtained between June of 2014 and August of 2016, involved sampling invertebrates within patches using the sweep net method. Samples were pooled from transects within patches, and recorded biomass and number of orders per patch are provided.
The primary objective of this research was to evaluate the potential for pyric herbivory to simultaneously benefit both fuels management and prairie-chicken conservation goals. These data were collected as part of this objective in order to evaluate species richeness.
For more information about this study and these data, see Elmore et al. (2017), Starns (2017), and Starns (2019).