Positive long-term effect of mulching on species and functional trait diversity in a nutrient-poor mountain meadow in Central Europe

0373544 - ÚVGZ 2012 RIV NL eng J - Článek v odborném periodiku
Doležal, Jiří - Mašková, Z. - Lepš, J. - Steinbachová, D. - de Bello, Francesco - Klimešová, Jitka - Tackenberg, O. - Zemek, František - Květ, Jan
Positive long-term effect of mulching on species and functional trait diversity in a nutrient-poor mountain meadow in Central Europe.
Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment. Roč. 145, č. 1 (2011), s. 10-28. ISSN 0167-8809. E-ISSN 1873-2305
Grant CEP: GA ČR GA206/99/1410; GA ČR GA526/09/0963
Výzkumný záměr: CEZ:AV0Z60870520; CEZ:AV0Z60050516
Klíčová slova: community weighted means * ecosystem function * functional diversity * meadow management * niche space * redundancy analysis * traits
Kód oboru RIV: EH - Ekologie - společenstva
Impakt faktor: 3.004, rok: 2011

Oligotrophic mountain meadows are threatened biodiversity hotspots throughout Europe. The traditional summer hay-making followed by autumn grazing is no longer economic and question is whether alternative managements can maintain both plant species and functional diversity typical of these habitats. In the Bohemian Forest Mts., we applied three treatments (mowing once a year - i.e., cutting and removing the biomass, mulching once a year - cutting and leaving the crushed biomass to decompose in situ, fallowing - no cutting) in order to assess temporal changes in meadow vegetation, plant trait composition and biomass production in a 13-year experiment. We recorded for each species twenty-five traits as to be most informative of plant strategies related to growth, resource acquisition and carbon-water economy. We compared different components of trait composition (community averages that mostly reflect traits of dominant species vs. the Rao index of functional diversity that reflects trait dissimilarity among species) and their impact on biomass production. We show that mulching promotes species and functional diversity by facilitating heliophilous forbs and legumes with more acquisitive strategies in resource use and release, e.g., higher foliar N and P content. This occurs at the expense of tall grasses (with resource-retentive strategies, e.g., high leaf dry matter content) which dominate the mown and fallow plots. The divergence in most quantitative traits indicates that niche complementarity is the dominant assembly process in mulched plots, which can prevent competitive exclusion and enable species coexistence. The divergent development was detected only after 5-6 years. This slow floristic and functional response is caused by acidity of soil and severe mountain climate that preclude rapid responses of vegetation to land-use changes.
Trvalý link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0206631