In many ecosystems, a significant portion of a restoration project budget is spent purchasing or collecting native seed. Despite the investment, seed predation after seeding a restoration project can drastically reduce the number of seeds available to germinate. One technique to combat the effect of seed predation is diversionary seeding—the addition of highly-palatable, low-cost seed or grain to a seed mix to divert seed predator attention. While this technique was developed decades ago, it has not been tested in many ecosystems. Here we test the effect of diversionary seeding by adding cracked corn to prairie restoration seed mixes and measuring seed predation and seeded seedling abundance, diversity, and composition.
Results/Conclusions
We found that adding cracked corn decreases seed predation of large seeded species and has no effect on small seeded species. Adding cracked corn also does not affect the density or diversity of seeded seedlings, but does shift the composition of seeded species to include more large seeded species. We conclude that diversionary seeding may be an important tool for reducing seed predation and increasing successful establishment of large-seeded species during prairie restoration. Also economically, as the seeds of large-seeded species are often more expensive, investment in diversionary seeding may reduce costs.