Epsilon Archive for Student Projects

Abstract

Invasive plants are one of the global threats to biodiversity. Acacia mearnsii was brought to South Africa from Australia 150 years ago and is known as a landscape transformer due to its invasive capacities, creating homogenous dense vegetation outcompeting endemic fauna. Elephants (Lox-odonta africana) are megaherbivores and can transform food webs, ecosystems and herbivore communities with their need for forage. As such, they have the potential of performing an ecosys-tem service by acting as an agent of biological control of A. mearnsii or perform ecosystem disser-vices by supporting the spread of the species. In this report, I review published literature on the in-teraction between elephants and A. mearnsii and identify a knowledge gap on their interactions. One scientific publication found in this review report that elephants consume A. mearnsii. A com-parison of plant traits between A. mearnsii and native African Acacias species frequently con-sumed by elephants suggests that the species could be an important source of food for elephants. Based on the comparison, it remains unclear whether elephants function as seed dispersers of the invasive species. This may be investigated by further research on seed germination after ingestion of A. mearnsii by elephants.