Seed hoarding animals may distinctly impact individual fitness of plants as well as plant community dynamics in terms of differential seed consumption and seed dispersal. Addressing methodological challenges and constraints in understanding the role of seed dispersal mutualisms, we tested different seed tagging methods for relatively small seeds. We selected two study areas with dense ground vegetation, irregular terrain, and seed predator guilds with comparatively high dispersal and seed removal potential. We tested three different tagging methods, offering untagged and tagged seeds on experimental dishes: (1) wire threads with plastic flags fixed with solvent‐free glue, (2) wire threads with plastic flags twisted around a beechnut, (3) and radio‐transmitters fixed with solvent‐free glue. Seed predators did not show any preferences for tagged or untagged seeds or for a certain tagging method at any point of time. Instead, both tagged seeds and untagged control seeds were removed from the dishes to a high degree (up to 100%) after 25–35 days. In both study areas, seeds with radio‐transmitters experienced longer transport distances with a maximum of nearly 60 m and distances also differed between study areas. In one study area, higher portions of radio‐tagged seeds could be recovered than for the flag‐tagged seeds. Significantly more seeds tagged with radio‐transmitters were cached than expected. Given the advantages and limitations of each approach, a combination of flag‐tagging and radio‐telemetry (not on the same seed) may be the best solution for tracking seed fate in dense vegetation or irregular terrain.

Herbivores are constitutive elements of most terrestrial ecosystems. Understanding effects of herbivory on ecosystem dynamics is thus a major, albeit challenging task in community ecology. Effects of mammals on plant communities are typically explored by comparing plant densities or diversity in exclosure experiments. This might over-estimate long-term herbivore effects at community levels as early life stage mortality is driven by a multitude of factors. Addressing these challenges, we established a set of 100 pairs of ungulate exclosures and unfenced control plots (25 m²) in mixed montane forests in the Alps in 1989 covering a forest area of 90 km². Investigations ran until 2013. Analogous to the gap-maker–gap-filler approach, dynamically recording the height of the largest trees per tree species in paired plots with and without exclosures might allow for assessing herbivore impacts on those individuals with a high probability of attaining reproductive stages. We thus tested if recording maximum heights of regenerating trees would better reflect effects of ungulate herbivory on long-term dynamics of tree regeneration than recording of stem density, and if species dominance patterns would shift over time. For quantifying the effects of ungulate herbivory simultaneously at community and species level we used principle response curves (PRC). PRCs yielded traceable results both at community and species level. Trajectories of maximum heights yielded significant results contrary to trajectories of total stem density. Response patterns of tree species were not uniform over time: e.g., both Norway spruce and European larch switched in their response to fencing. Fencing explained about 3% of the variance of maximum tree heights after nine years but increased to about 10% after 24 years thus confirming the importance of long-term surveys. Maximum height dynamics of tree species, addressed in our study, can thus reflect local dominance of tree species via asymmetric plant competition. Such effects, both within and among forest patches, can accrue over time shaping forest structure and composition.

In mast‐seeding species, strong annual variation in seed production is assumed to drive seed fate and ultimately plant recruitment. However, the effects of temporal variation in seed crops on spatial patterns of seed rain and recruitment are poorly understood, in part because of limited data on fine‐scale spatial variation of seed deposition. To investigate how mast‐seeding affects spatial variation in seed rain, we analysed a 15‐year data set on seed rain and population dynamics in a montane old‐growth forest (2 plots with 81 seed traps per ha), dominated by European beech Fagus sylvatica and, to a lesser degree, Norway spruce Picea abies and European silver fir Abies alba . Using geostatistical methods and point process modelling, we modeled 1) the relationship between annual seed crop and spatial heterogeneity of seed rain, 2) the temporal stability of seed rain hotspots and 3) the spatial relation of seed rain and recruitment into the population. The results illustrate the interaction between temporal and spatial variation in seed production and its consequences for population dynamics of mast‐seeding trees. The signature of annual variation in seed rain fades with seedling mortality over time in all three focal species. For beech, the cumulative probability of seed arrival over the whole study period drives spatial seedling and sapling dispersion patterns – mediated by light competition with older trees; seedling density was most strongly reduced by sapling density, while saplings were most frequently found in areas of low adult density. Such decoupling of spatial processes across life history stages, combined with spatial heterogeneity may play a larger role in driving stand‐level spatial dynamics than previously assumed.

Successfully managing heavily visited protected riverscapes requires information about visitor preferences for the social, biophysical and infrastructural attributes of river landscapes. This study analyzed the landscape preferences of 520 on-site visitors to the peri-urban Danube Floodplains National Park using an image-based discrete choice experiment. The study explored the effects of various landscape types (water bodies, terrestrial landscapes), recreational infrastructures (trail types, facilities) and trail use conditions (trail user numbers, activities) on respondents’ preferences. The results indicated that natural features, such as floodplain forests in combination with meadows or xeric alluvial biotopes, were preferred, while dense forests and, particularly, open agrarian structures were less preferred. Water bodies with 50% reed cover, few people on the trail, alleys of trees and gravel trails were favored. The outcomes serve as the basis for design recommendations for planned recreational areas surrounding the national park with the aim of absorbing visitors and reducing use pressure on the protected area.

Mast seeding, the synchronized interannual variation in seed production of trees, is a well‐known bottom‐up driver for population densities of granivorous forest rodents. Such demographic effects also affect habitat preferences of the animals: After large seed production events, reduced habitat selectivity can lead to spillover from forest patches into adjacent alpine meadows or clear‐cuts, as has been reported for human‐impacted forests. In unmanaged, primeval forests, however, gaps created by natural disturbances are typical elements, yet it is unclear whether the same spillover dynamics occur under natural conditions. To determine whether annual variation in seed production drives spillover effects in naturally formed gaps, we used 14 years of small mammal trapping data combined with seed trap data to estimate population densities of Apodemus spp. mice and bank voles (Myodes glareolus) on 5 forest sites with differing disturbance history. The study sites, located in a forest dominated by European beech (Fagus sylvatica), Norway spruce (Picea abies), and silver fir (Abies alba), consisted of two primeval forest sites with small canopy gaps, two sites with larger gaps (after an avalanche event and a windthrow event), and a managed forest stand with closed canopy as a control. Hierarchical Bayesian N‐mixture models revealed a strong influence of seed rain on small rodent abundance, which were site‐specific for M. glareolus but not for Apodemus spp. Following years of moderate or low seed crop, M. glareolus avoided open habitat patches but colonized those habitats in large numbers after full mast events, suggesting that spillover events also occur in unmanaged forests, but not in all small rodents. The species‐ and site‐specific characteristics of local density responding to food availability have potentially long‐lasting effects on forest gap regeneration dynamics and should be addressed in future studies.