The relationship between species richness and biomass changes from boreal to subtropical forests in China

Wu, Xian; Wang, Xiangping; Tang, Zhiyao; Shen, Zehao; Zheng, Chengyang; Xia, Xinli; Fang, Jingyun

doi:10.1111/ecog.00940

Cited by 82 publications

(100 citation statements)

References 58 publications

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“…More specifically, it was found that species richness was significantly and positively correlated with AGC. Indeed, it is a well-known pattern, especially at the global scale, that carbon stocks increase with increasing diversity [27,29,65]. The positive relationships between tree species diversity and carbon stocks in this study supports the idea that diversity-carbon patterns are also identifiable even at smaller spatial scales.…”

Section: Agb and Agc Stocks At The Stand Levelsupporting

confidence: 83%

Aboveground Biomass and Carbon in a South African Mistbelt Forest and the Relationships with Tree Species Diversity and Forest Structures

Mensah

Veldtman

Toit

et al. 2016

Forests

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Biomass and carbon stocks are key information criteria to understand the role of forests in regulating global climate. However, for a bio-rich continent like Africa, ground-based measurements for accurate estimation of carbon are scarce, and the variables affecting the forest carbon are not well understood. Here, we present the first biomass study conducted in South Africa Mistbelt forests. Using data from a non-destructive sampling of 59 trees of four species, we (1) evaluated the accuracy of multispecies aboveground biomass (AGB) models, using predictors such as diameter at breast height (DBH), total height (H) and wood density; (2) estimated the amount of biomass and carbon stored in the aboveground compartment of Mistbelt forests and (3) explored the variation of aboveground carbon (AGC) in relation to tree species diversity and structural variables. We found significant effects of species on wood density and AGB. Among the candidate models, the model that incorporated DBH and H as a compound variable (DBH 2ˆH ) was the best fitting. AGB and AGC values were highly variable across all plots, with average values of 358.1 Mg¨ha´1 and 179.0 Mg¨C¨ha´1, respectively. Few species contributed 80% of AGC stock, probably as a result of selection effect. Stand basal area, basal area of the ten most important species and basal area of the largest trees were the most influencing variables. Tree species richness was also positively correlated with AGC, but the basal area of smaller trees was not. These results enable insights into the role of biodiversity in maintaining carbon storage and the possibilities for sustainable strategies for timber harvesting without risk of significant biomass decline.

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Section: Agb and Agc Stocks At The Stand Levelsupporting

confidence: 83%

Aboveground Biomass and Carbon in a South African Mistbelt Forest and the Relationships with Tree Species Diversity and Forest Structures

Mensah

Veldtman

Toit

et al. 2016

Forests

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“…; He, Bertness & Altieri ; Prior & Bowman ), and evidence suggests that positive relationships between diversity and productivity are in fact more common where environmental conditions are most limiting (Paquette & Messier ; Wu et al . ; Toïgo et al . ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Climate modulates the effects of tree diversity on forest productivity

et al. 2015

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Summary Despite growing evidence that, on average, diverse forests tend to be more productive than species‐poor ones, individual studies often report strongly contrasting relationships between tree species richness and above‐ground wood production (AWP). In the attempt to reconcile these apparently inconsistent results, we explored whether the strength and shape of AWP–diversity relationships shifts along spatial and temporal environmental gradients in forests across Europe. We used tree ring data from a network of permanent forest plots distributed at six sites across Europe to estimate annual AWP over a 15‐year period (1997–2011). We then tested whether the relationship between tree species richness and AWP changes (i) across sites as a function of large‐scale gradients in climatic productivity and tree packing density and (ii) among years within each sites as a result of fluctuating climatic conditions. AWP–species richness relationships varied markedly among sites. As predicted by theory, the relationship shifted from strongly positive at sites where climate imposed a strong limitation on wood production and tree packing densities were low, to weakly negative at sites where climatic conditions for growth were most suitable. In contrast, we found no consistent effect of interannual fluctuations in climate on the strength of AWP–species richness relationships within sites. Synthesis. Our results indicate that the shape and strength of the relationship between tree diversity and forest productivity depends critically on environmental context. Across Europe, tree diversity shows the greatest potential to positively influence forest productivity at either end of the latitudinal gradient, where adverse climatic conditions limit productivity and lead to the development of less densely packed stands.

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“…That could be related to the lower soil nutrient availability in conifer stands indicated by lower soil C:N ratio (Cools et al, 2014;Dawud et al, 2017), and thus to the need to allocate more biomass in fine roots in nutrient poor conditions (Finér et al, 2007;Helmisaari et al, 2007). In addition to diversity and identity effects other stand characteristics, soil properties and climatic conditions affect fine root productivity and these relationships have been studied in European forests (Finér et al, 2007;Helmisaari et al, 2007;Lehtonen et al, 2016) and other geographic areas (Finér et al, 2011;Wu et al, 2015). Fine root biomass has been shown to increase with stand basal area, age and soil C:N ratio in European forests (Finér et al, 2007;Helmisaari et al, 2007;Lehtonen et al, 2016), but the relationship between fine root biomass and mean annual temperature and precipitation has not been significant (Finér et al, 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Reported relationships were positive (Schmid, 2002;Meinen et al, 2009a;Brassard et al, 2011, Brassard et al, 2013Laclau et al, 2013;Bu et al, 2017;Ma and Chen, 2017;Sun et al, 2017), insignificant (Hendricks and Bianchi, 1995;Schmid and Kazda, 2002;Bauhus et al, 2000;Meinen et al, 2009b, Meinen et al, 2009cJacob et al, 2010, Jacob et al, 2013Brassard et al, 2013;Lei et al, 2012b;Domisch et al, 2015;Ma and Chen, 2017) or negative (Bolte and Villanueva, 2006). The more numerous studies between tree species diversity and above-ground biomass and biomass production of trees show more consistent positive diversity effects (Zhang et al, 2012;Gamfeldt et al, 2013;Vilà et al, 2013;Ratcliffe et al, 2015;Toïgo et al, 2015;Wu et al, 2015;Jucker et al, 2016;Liang et al, 2016;Pretsch and Schütze, 2016), suggesting that tree species diversity effects on above-ground biomass or productivity are not necessarily mirrored by tree fine root productivity (Bauhus et al, 2000;Chen and Klinka, 2003;Brassard et al, 2011;Lei et al, 2012a). There are no comprehensive studies explaining the inconsistent responses of fine root biomass or productivity to tree species diversity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There are no comprehensive studies explaining the inconsistent responses of fine root biomass or productivity to tree species diversity. The varying above-ground biomass and productivity responses have been related to different climatic conditions and site productivity (Paquette and Messier, 2011;Jucker et al, 2014a, Jucker et al, 2016Potter and Woodall, 2014;Ratcliffe et al, 2015;Toïgo et al, 2015;Wu et al, 2015), suggesting that responses are positive under cold or dry climatic conditions and at low site productivity. Thus, systematic studies covering a wide range of mature forest ecosystems and tree species and their combinations are still needed to understand below-ground productivity responses to tree species diversity, identity, stand characteristics and soil properties.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Conifer proportion explains fine root biomass more than tree species diversity and site factors in major European forest types

Finér

Domisch

Dawud

et al. 2017

Forest Ecology and Management

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A B S T R A C TFine roots (diameter ≤ 2 mm) contribute significantly to the forest carbon cycle and are essential for resource acquisition from the soil. We conducted a study to assess the relationships between tree and ground vegetation fine root biomass and tree species diversity (monocultures compared to 2-5 species mixtures), conifer proportion and other site factors (stand basal area, soil carbon stocks and C:N ratio) in the six major European forest types, boreal forest in Finland, temperate forests in Poland, Germany and Romania, thermophilous deciduous forests in Italy, and Mediterranean forests in Spain. We sampled the fine roots of trees and ground vegetation to the depth of 20 cm in the mineral soil and allocated the fine root biomass to individual tree species using near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS). We did not find any general positive effects of tree species diversity on the fine root biomass of trees or ground vegetation across the forest types and tree species combinations. However, our results suggest that tree fine root biomass increases with tree species diversity in pure broadleaf forests, but not in pure conifer forests. Species diversity explained 7% of the variation in tree fine root biomass in the broadleaf stands. The narrow tree species diversity gradient (1-2 species) in the conifer forests compared to the broadleaf forests (1−4) may have decreased the probability of conifer species combinations with below-ground functional traits conducive to over-yielding. Some evidence of diversity-mediated changes in the vertical rooting patterns of broadleaf trees and ground vegetation were found within the entire organic and 0-20 cm mineral soil layer although the weighted mean depth of fine root biomass was not affected. Negative diversity effects were found in the organic layer and positive diversity effects in the 0-10 cm mineral soil layer for broadleaf tree fine root biomass. Diversity effects were negative for ground vegetation fine root biomass in the 0-10 cm mineral soil layer. There was a general positive effect of conifer proportion on total fine root biomass in the organic layer, but not in the mineral soil layers. In general conifer proportion and site factors explained more of the variation in tree fine root biomass than tree species diversity. More research covering the annual variation in fine root biomass and deeper soil layers is needed before recommending managing species-rich forest for increasing below-ground biomass and carbon pools.

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The relationship between species richness and biomass changes from boreal to subtropical forests in China

Cited by 82 publications

References 58 publications

Aboveground Biomass and Carbon in a South African Mistbelt Forest and the Relationships with Tree Species Diversity and Forest Structures

Aboveground Biomass and Carbon in a South African Mistbelt Forest and the Relationships with Tree Species Diversity and Forest Structures

Climate modulates the effects of tree diversity on forest productivity

Conifer proportion explains fine root biomass more than tree species diversity and site factors in major European forest types

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