Litter and its interaction with standing vegetation affect seedling recruitment in Tibetan alpine grasslands

Abstract

Background: Seedling recruitment is widely recognised to be important in the maintenance of diversity and coexistence of species. It is not clear how local abiotic factors mediated by litter and biotic interactions influence plant species recruitment in alpine grasslands.

Aims: To determine how litter and standing vegetation affected seedling recruitment in plant communities in Tibetan alpine grasslands.

Methods: Seedling recruitment was quantified in response to experimental treatments: (1) removal of standing vegetation and litter; (2) removal of standing vegetation with litter intact; (3) intact standing vegetation and removal of litter and (4) control: intact standing vegetation and litter.

Results: Litter removal increased seedling numbers, while standing vegetation removal had no effect. An interaction between litter and standing vegetation removal marginally increased seedling number. Species richness of seedlings was not related to either litter removal or standing vegetation removal. Species composition of seedling differed significantly between removal of both litter and standing vegetation and control.

Conclusions: Litter and its interaction with standing vegetation has an important role in affecting plant species recruitment in this alpine plant community. In contrast, biotic interactions, such as competition or facilitation from standing vegetation, appear to have only minor effects on recruitment.

Keywords:

• litter removal
• seedling number
• seedling recruitment
• seedling species composition
• seedling species richness
• standing vegetation removal

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Eric Lamb for useful comments and assistance in editing of the manuscript. We also thank three anonymous referees and the editor in chief, who provided useful comments on the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was financially supported by Natural Science Foundation of China [30970466 to S.T.Z] and the Open Project Program of State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-ecosystems.

Notes on contributors

Jianli Yuan

Jianli Yuan is an associate professor in ecology. He is interested in evolutional ecology and ecology education.

Defei Liang

Defie Liang is a Ph.D. student in ecology.

Shiting Zhang

Shiting Zhang is a professor in ecology. He is currently interested in litter decomposition and grazing effects on diversity in the Tibetan grasslands.