Resistance of steppe communities to extreme drought in northeast China
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Resistance of steppe communities to extreme drought in northeast China Wang Ma & Xiaosa Liang & Zhengwen Wang Wentao Luo & Qiang Yu & Xingguo Han
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Received: 18 May 2020 / Revised: 4 November 2020 / Accepted: 8 November 2020 # Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract Background and Aims Declaring the drought-resistance of plant communities in grassland and the underlying mechanisms is crucial under climatic change scenario. Here we aimed to quantify aboveground & belowground net primary productivity (ANPP & BNPP) and their allocation in response to extreme droughts, and to uncover any underlying factors of drought resistance. Methods We experimentally reduced growing season rainfall by 66% for four years in two grassland sites (Sandy and Loamy site respectively), and measured ANPP and BNPP yearly and evaluated the relatedness of drought-induced changes for them to plant traits
Responsible Editor: Janusz J. Zwiazek. W. Ma : X. Liang : Z. Wang (*) : W. Luo Erguna Forest-Steppe Ecotone Research Station, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China e-mail: [email protected] W. Ma University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100049 Beijing, China Q. Yu Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, 100081 Beijing, China X. Han State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China
(Plant height, δ13C, SLA and LNC) and community composition. Results Experimental drought decreased species richness, ANPP of forbs and the total at both sites, but decreased ANPP of grasses only at the Sandy site. Experimental drought has non-significant effect on total BNPP at both sites, but increased 10–20 cm BNPP and decreased 0–10 cm BNPP. BNPP ratio was kept unchanged at the Loamy site but increased at the Sandy site. Moreover, the communities at the Loamy site showed lower δ13C, SLA and LNC, but greater height. Conclusions Our study demonstrates that extreme drought can impact community productivity and structure, and highlights the importance of plant traits, community composition and soil properties in modulating the responses and resistance of steppe communities to extreme drought. Keywords Climate change . Temperate steppe . Plant functional traits . Aboveground and belowground net primary productivity . Vertical root distribution
Introduction As an ecosystem attribute, resistance is usually defined as the capacity of an ecosystem to remain relatively stable levels of structure and function in face of disturbance or extreme climatic fluctuations (Grime et al. 2000; Grman et al. 2010; Pfisterer and Schmid 2002). Mechanisms of ecosystem resistance have been a hot topic in ecology and have been intensively studied, but
Plant Soil
understanding is still limited due to the complexity of natural ecosystems (Donohue et al. 2013). A large number of studies have assessed community resistance to changes in precipitation, temperature and climate extr
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