Management of silvo-pastoral systems in planted and natural forests in semi-arid Mediterranean regions often employs seasonal night corrals for animal protection. This management system changes the spatial distribution of animal excreta, resulting in a net transfer of soil mineral resources and their accumulation in the corrals. After abandonment, corrals are colonized by ruderal species, becoming

In desert ecosystems, water is a restricting factor for plant growth and vegetation dynamics. The relatively stable water source from deep soil profile or groundwater is important for plant survival during drought. Understanding water use strategy of endangered species, in desert ecosystem is essential for their conservation and restoration such as Ammopiptanthus mongolicus on the Mongolian Plateau

Climate warming and increasing nitrogen (N) deposition have influenced plant nutrient status and thus plant carbon (C) fixation and vegetation composition in boreal peatlands. Phenols, which are secondary metabolites in plants for defense and adaptation, also play important roles in regulating peatland C dynamics due to their anti-decomposition properties. However, how the phenolic levels of different

Soil lead contamination has become increasingly serious and phytoremediation can provide an effective way to reclaim the contaminated soils. This study aims to examine the growth, lead resistance and lead accumulation of mulberry (Morus alba L.) seedlings at four levels of soil lead contamination with or without biochar addition under normal or alternative partial root-zone irrigation (APRI).

Determining the ecological consequences of interactions between slow changes in long-term climate means and amplified variability in climate is an important research frontier in plant ecology. We combined the recent approach of climate sensitivity functions with a revised hydrological ‘bucket model’ to improve predictions on how plant species will respond to changes in the mean and variance of groundwater

Long-term heavy grazing reduces plant diversity and ecosystem function by intensifying nitrogen (N) and water limitation. In contrast, the absence of biomass removal can cause species loss by elevating light competition and weakening community stability, which is exacerbated by N and water enrichment. Hence, how to maintain species diversity and community stability is still a huge challenge for sustainable

Grasslands are globally threatened by climate changes and unsustainable land-use, which often cause transitions among alternative stable states, and even catastrophic transition to desertification. Spatial vegetation patch configurations have been shown to signify such transitions at large spatial scale. Here, we demonstrate how small-scale patch configurations can also indicate state transitions.

Darwin’s naturalization hypothesis proposes that successfully established alien species are less closely related to native species due to differences in their ecological niches. Studies have provided support both for and against this hypothesis. One reason for this is the tendency for phylogenetic clustering between aliens and natives at broad spatial scales with overdispersion at fine scales. However

Populus deltoides and P. euramericana are widely used in China as major forestry species. At present, little is known about their responses to nitrogen (N) deficiency when grown in monocultures or mixed plantations. The aim of this investigation was to analyze the growth, and morphological and physiological responses of P. deltoides and P. euramericana to different N levels under competition conditions

Drought stress and the degree of drought severity are predicted to rise under highly variable patterns of precipitation due to climate change, while the capacity of trees to cope with drought-recovery through physiological and biochemical adjustment remains unclear. We aimed to examine the coupling of physiology and biochemistry in trees during drought and the following recovery.

Accurate prediction of spatiotemporal variations in carbon and water fluxes of heterogeneous landscape is critical to comprehensively address the effects of climate change and vegetation dynamics on landscape and regional carbon and water cycling.

The conifer litter is fairly recalcitrant and nutrient poor, and broadleaved litter promotes coniferous litter decomposition by increasing degradable nutrients and promoting microbial metabolism. Mixing Pinus massoniana litter and three broadleaved litters may increase the diversity and abundance of fungal decomposers compared with those in P. massoniana litter and vary depending on the number and

Gunnera tinctoria is an unusual N-fixing plant species that has become invasive worldwide, generally in environments with a low evaporative demand and/or high rainfall. Amongst the many mechanisms that may explain its success as an introduced species, a contrasting phenology could be important but this may depend on an ability to grow and utilize nutrients under sub-optimal conditions. We examined

Drought and salinity are severe abiotic stress factors, which limit plant growth and productivity, particularly in desert regions. In this study, we employed two desert poplars, Populus euphratica Oliver and Populus pruinosa Schrenk seedlings, to compare their tolerance to drought, salinity and combined stress.

The last years, Central European forests have suffered from drought as a direct consequence of climate change. All these forests have a long management history and it lies in the landowner’s responsibility to replant damaged forests. Hence, landowners and the government are searching currently for species suitable to replant in areas affected by tree die-offs. It’s a matter of fact that good knowledge

Plant-pollinator interaction networks are dynamic entities, and seasonal variation in plant phenology can reshape their structure on both short and long timescales. However, such seasonal dynamics are rarely considered, especially for oceanic island pollination networks. Here, we assess changes in the temporal dynamics of plant-pollinator interactions in response to seasonal variation in floral resource

The functions of global forests are threatened by the increasing frequency of severe drought. Due to drought inducing reductions in soil nutrient availability, efficiencies of nutrient use and resorption of trees become crucial for forest functions and biogeochemical cycles. However, understanding the dynamics of responses of foliar nutrient use and resorption efficiencies to drought, especially in

Among terrestrial ecosystems, coastal sandy dunes are particularly prone to alien plant invasion. Many studies related the invasion of dune habitats to anthropic causes, but less is known about the role of soil properties and plant traits in plant invasion. In this study we tested the relationships between soil features and alien plant invasion in dune systems, focusing on the interplay between soil

Research on the effects of extreme rainfall events on ecosystem function has primarily focussed on drought or flooding events, which usually include changes to mean or total rainfall, annually or over a season. However, less is known about the effects of increased rainfall variability without change to mean or total amounts. We investigated the effects of increased variation of water supply on shoot

Salt marsh vegetation is an important contributor of dissolved organic matter (DOM) to coastal waters. The dynamics of DOM leaching from different marsh plants, however, have not been well studied or compared.

Seed dispersal by endozoochory is an important process in plant regeneration and the establishment of new populations. Seeds with dormancy may especially benefit after disperser gut passage. However, the ways in which gut passage affect the germination of plant species with physiological dormancy remain unclear. Here, we experimentally assessed the mutualistic interaction between the Austral parakeet

Litterfall at a global scale is affected by climate, edaphic features and vegetation structure, with litter production increasing from grasslands to forests following the rise in standing biomass. However, at landscape scales, the same relationship between litter production and vegetation structure has rarely been studied and comparisons of litterfall patterns between adjacent, structurally distinct

Although soil environments exist extensive heterogeneity for many plants with a wide range of distribution, researches about effects of soil conditions on plants’ tolerance and adaptation are particularly inadequate. In our study, the aims are to reveal physiological strategies of Populus deltoides against drought stress under different soil conditions and to select the most suitable soil type for

Pedogenesis along chronosequences has received attention from soil scientists for decades, following the pioneering work of Walker and Syers (1976), who showed a general pattern of the availability of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) subsequently confirmed for a range of chronosequences (Huggett 1998; Turner and Condron 2013; Vitousek and Farrington 1997). Much more recently, changes of plant nutrient-acquisition

Observer error is an unavoidable aspect of vegetation surveys involving human observers. We quantified four components of inter-observer error associated with long-term monitoring of prairie vegetation: overlooking error, misidentification error, cautious error, and estimation error. We also evaluated the association of plot size with pseudoturnover due to observer error, and how documented pseudochanges

Mosses are dominant in many ecosystems where nutrients from deposition are one of the main nutrient sources. However, it is difficult to evaluate mosses' role in nutrient cycling without knowledge of how mosses use deposited nutrient inputs. To fill this gap, the present study aims to investigate: (1) how nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) concentrations of new-grown segments change along a gradient of

Bacteria and fungi are two primary groups of soil microbes, and their stability determines the persistence of microbial functions in response to a changing environment. Recent studies reported higher fungal than bacterial stability under precipitation alteration, the underlying mechanisms, however, remain elusive.

Ecological strategies related to the adaptation of plants to environmental stress have long been studied by ecologists, but few studies have systematically revealed the ecological process of plant adaptation to herbivores as a whole.

Global change factors (e.g. warming and nitrogen deposition) may influence biological invasions, but how these factors may influence the performance of invasive species and further mediate the interactions with native competitors remain still unknown.

Intensive land management practices can compromise soil biodiversity, thus jeopardizing long-term soil productivity. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) play a pivotal role in promoting soil productivity through obligate symbiotic associations with plants. However, it is not clear how properties of plant communities, especially species richness and composition influence the viability of AMF populations

Climate change in the eastern Mediterranean region will have a strong impact on ecosystem functioning and plant community dynamics due to a reduction in annual rainfall and increased variability. We aim to understand the role of seed banks as potential buffers against climatic uncertainty determined by climate change.

As one of the most important agents driving floral evolution, pollinators shape the diversity of flowers in angiosperms. However, most previous studies have only quantified pollinators driving the evolution of a single floral trait, and experimental estimates of the potential role of pollinators in shaping the evolution of floral trait associations are relatively rare.

Subalpine coniferous species are distributed over a wide range of elevations in which they must contend with stressful conditions, such as high elevations and extended periods of darkness. Two evergreen coniferous species, Abies veitchii and Abies mariesii, dominate at low and high elevations, respectively, in the subalpine zone, central Japan. The aim of this study is to examine the effects of leaf

Global change may cause unparalleled supplies of soil nutrients and further lead to stoichiometric imbalance of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) in terrestrial plants. While previous studies had reported the effects of global change factors on plant N, P contents and their ratios, few had examined whether or how these factors may influence the scaling of these two elements.

Biodiversity is often positively related to the capacity of an ecosystem to provide multiple functions simultaneously (i.e. multifunctionality). However, there is some controversy over whether biodiversity–multifunctionality relationships depend on the number of functions considered. Particularly, investigators have documented contrasting findings that the effects of biodiversity on ecosystem multifunctionality

Plants have limited resources for defenses and species that invest in biotic defenses might exhibit leaves that invest less in other types of defenses. We have investigated whether plants that have few mechanical defenses, but have extrafloral nectaries (EFNs) patrolled by ants, are less prone to herbivory, compared with plants without EFNs that have tougher leaves.

This article is a Commentary on O’Brien et al. (2020, 13: 389–97).

Plant invasions have the potential to affect the community structure of soil nematodes, but little is known about whether such effects are mediated by aboveground herbivores since invasive plants are not completely released from herbivores in the introduced range. In this study, we explored how aboveground insect herbivores mediated the effect of invasive plant Alternanthera philoxeroides on soil nematodes

With the increase of land-use change, habitat fragmentation has become a major factor affecting plant diversity. Generally, when the adult density is high, the survival rate of conspecific saplings may decline and provide more resources and space for other species to maintain a high local species diversity. Therefore, the spatial relationship of conspecific saplings and adults (SRCSA) can regulate

In a contact zone between related taxa, phenotypic variation can result from genetic and/or environmental gradients. This study aimed to clarify the cause of phenotypic variation in leaf morphology of two Quercus crispula varieties—crispula (QCC) and mongolicoides (QCM)—in their contact zone along an altitudinal gradient.

Individual growth constitutes a major component of individual fitness. However, measuring growth rates of herbaceous plants non-destructively at the individual level is notoriously difficult. This study, based on an accurate non-destructive method of aboveground biomass estimation, aims to assess individual relative growth rates (RGRs) of some species, identify its environmental drivers and test its

Natural vegetation plays an important role in global carbon cycling and storage. Thus, the Cerrado (Brazilian savannah) is considered a carbon sink because of its intrinsic characteristics. Our aim was to evaluate how the aboveground biomass and biodiversity relationship change between three Cerrado remnants with different protection status: a ‘control area’ (Legal Reserve area), a protected area (PA)

Pluchea indica is a mangrove-associate species, known for its medicinal properties in its native range and being invasive in part of its introduced range. This study aimed to assess geographic distribution of genetic variation of this species across its distribution range, identify the factors influencing its genetic structure and use this information to suggest conservation and management strategies

Bee-pollinated flowers are rarely red, presumably because bees (which lack red receptors) have difficulty detecting red targets. Although the response of bees to red colour has been investigated in lab experiments, most stimuli have been pure red, while the subtle diversity of red as perceived by humans (human-red) has received very limited attention. Here we test the hypothesis that ultraviolet (UV)

Plants can benefit from heterogeneous environments via disproportionately increasing resource harvesting in resource-rich patches. Their initial growing positions with respect to resource patches may thus have important influences on their performance and relative competitive ability. Such impacts may differ between species with contrasting spatial architectures. However, the potential influence of

We aimed to evaluate how climatic fluctuations influence the plasticity of anatomical vessel traits and the width of annual tree-rings of two relict-endemic Mexican Magnolia species. Notwithstanding, few studies have assessed the drought effect on vessel traits in tropical montane cloud trees of eastern Mexico.

Non-structural carbohydrates (NSCs) are plant storage compounds used for metabolism, transport, osmoregulation and regrowth following the loss of plant tissue. Even in conditions suitable for optimal growth, plants continue to store NSCs. This storage may be due to passive accumulation from sink-inhibited growth or active reserves that come at the expense of growth. The former pathway implies that

The ability to form persistent seed banks is one of the best predictors of species’ potential to establish in new ranges. Wild sunflower is native to North America where the formation of persistent seed banks is promoted by disturbance and it plays a key role on the establishment and persistence of native populations. However, the role of the seed banks on the establishment and persistence of invasive

Predicting drought consequences on forests and fruit crop plantings requires improved understanding of drought responses of both leaf and fine-root resource acquisitive traits (specific leaf area—SLA, specific root surface area—SRA and specific root length—SRL). We hypothesize their responses are coordinated towards integrated plant resource conservation under severe drought.

Journal of Plant Ecology (JPE) was launched in 2008 by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Botanical Society of China and the Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The journal publishes peer-reviewed research and review articles across all fields of contemporary plant ecology, including ecophysiology, population ecology, community ecology, ecosystems ecology and landscape ecology

The response pattern of terrestrial soil respiration to warming during non-growing seasons is a poorly understood phenomenon, though many believe that these warming effects are potentially significant. This study was conducted in a semiarid temperate steppe to examine the effects of warming during the non-growing seasons on soil respiration and the underlying mechanisms associated therewith.

Understanding how tree species regulate multiple types of secondary chemicals along elevational gradients is critical for elucidating the physiological and ecological strategies of plants in response to varying biotic and/or abiotic environments. This study aims to examine how Chinese tallow tree (Triadica sebifera) allocates resources to the production of different secondary chemicals in response

The importance of density-dependent mortality in maintaining tree species diversity is widely accepted. However, density-dependent effects may vary in magnitude and direction with different abiotic conditions in forests. Theoretical predictions surmise that density-dependent effects may vary with soil available nitrogen (AN), but this still needs to be tested.

Harsh environmental conditions in alpine ecosystems shape vegetation structure into patches, where many different plant species cluster and grow together. Yet, which factors are important for the structure and dynamics of such plant–patch networks remains poorly understood. We aim to assess which and how environmental and biotic factors predict the assembly of plant–patch networks along a mountain

Litterfall is a key parameter in forest biogeochemical cycle and fire risk prediction. However, considerable uncertainty remains regarding the litterfall variations with forest ages. Quantifying the interannual variation of forest litterfall is crucial for reducing uncertainties in large-scale litterfall prediction.

In dry tropical forests, herbaceous species may have dormancy mechanisms and form persistent and transient seed banks in the soil. Evolutionarily acquired, these mechanisms are efficient for the establishment and survival of these herbs, especially in forests with unpredictable climates, such as the Caatinga. Thus, our objective was to verify whether the studied herbaceous species adopt the physical

Cistus albidus reproductive traits have been studied on typical Mediterranean shrublands along a water availability gradient in Northeastern Iberian Peninsula. Germination of this species is known to be highly favoured by fire. Moreover, Mediterranean species are particularly dependent on water availability. Therefore, we establish the hypothesis that in addition to fire disturbance, seedling recruitment