Table 1. Results of linear mixed models testing effects of deer exclosure and year on measures of plant community structure from the soil seed bank and aboveground vegetation.

Response	Deer exclusion	P	Year	P
Seed Bank Germinants
Seedling richness	3.706	0.054	143.58	<0.001
Seedling diversity (Shannon-Wiener index)	10.244	0.001	42.647	<0.001
Total germinants	5.234	0.022	81.972	<0.001
Relative abundance annuals and biennials	17.863	<0.001	23.988	0.002
Proportion native species germinated	4.679	0.031	55.309	<0.001
Proportion native germinants	4.784	0.029	42.948	<0.001
Aboveground Vegetation
Aboveground species richness	0.323	0.570	48.922	<0.001
Aboveground diversity (Shannon-Wiener index)	1.088	0.297	25.617	<0.001
Aboveground cover	0.027	0.870	40.953	<0.001
Relative cover of annuals and biennials	0.013	0.911	7.258	0.064
Woody stems	17.731	0.035	3.678	0.597
Proportion native species	11.046	<0.001	65.777	<0.001
Proportion native cover	0.874	0.350	27.216	<0.001

The year-by-deer exclusion interaction was never significant and subsequently dropped from all models; df  = 5 for germinant models and df  = 3 for aboveground vegetation models. Initial values shown are χ ² values for likelihood tests excluding treatment of interest. Bold values denote statistical significance at P≤0.05.