Effects of different soil thickness, water and planting patterns on the litter mass loss and stoichiometry characteristics of two herbs in the karst regions

Yajie, 赵雅洁 Zhao; Jing, 张晶 Zhang; Haiyan, 宋海燕 Song; Zhou, 李周 Li; Suhui, 李素慧 Li; Jianping, 陶建平 Tao; Jinchun, 刘锦春 Liu

doi:10.5846/stxb201802080341

Cited by 1 publication

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“…However, studies on karstic stoichiometry to date have mostly focused on a single component of the ecosystem (leaves [46,47], litter [48,49] or soil [4,50,51]) or on two components (leaves-litter [52], leaves-soil [16,53] or litter-soil [54,55]), or on a single organ of a tree species (leaf or fine root [14]). Relatively fewer studies have been conducted on the synergistic changes between plant-litter-soil as a continuum with vegetation succession (and those that have pay more attention to the general type of landform [9,13,[20][21][22][23]42,56]), limiting the understanding of nutrient cycling in forest ecosystems in the karstic area of Maolan.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stoichiometric Characteristics of Leaf, Litter and Soil during Vegetation Succession in Maolan National Nature Reserve, Guizhou, China

Zhou

Ying-chun

et al. 2022

Sustainability

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Carbon (C), nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) are the main nutrient elements widely found in soil, litter and leaves, and their stoichiometric ratios are important indicators of ecosystem functions. However, there is little research on the effects that nutrient cycle and vegetation succession have on leaf, litter and soil nutrients and stoichiometric ratios, especially in the fragile karst areas. To reveal the nutrient cycling characteristics and ecosystem stability mechanism during vegetation succession, leaf, litter and soil samples were collected from the herbaceous community (HC), shrub community (SC), secondary forest community (SF) and primary forest community (PF) in a typical karst area at growth and senescence phases. The results showed that the nutrient contents and stoichiometric ratios of leaf, litter and soil in the main layers of each community were significantly different at the growth and senescence phase. The utilization efficiency of N in the leaves of the main layers of each succession community first decreased and then increased at different growth stages, and the utilization efficiency of P increased but the reabsorption rates of N and P showed a continuous decreasing trend. In addition, there was a significant allometric relationship between N and P contents in plant leaves during the growth phase. More importantly, the internal stability of N content in plant leaves was higher than the P content, suggesting that vegetation succession significantly affected leaf, litter and soil nutrient contents and their stoichiometric ratios in our study region. The strength of the relationship between them reflects the inheritance and co–variation of nutrient content to a certain extent, and the differences in the strategies that different species in the community use to adapt to the fragile karst environment. This study concludes that plants in the karst region mainly improve their P utilization efficiency to adapt to low phosphorus stress in soil and ensure the normal physiological and biochemical responses in the process of vegetation succession.

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