Decoupled responses of the stability of above‐ and belowground productivity to drought and clipping in an alpine meadow

作者：Fangfang Ma, Ruiyang Zhang, Jens‐Christian Svenning, Fangyue Zhang, Yunlong He, Jinsong Wang, Dashuan Tian, Qingping Zhou, Shuli Niu · 发表于：Journal of Ecology · 年份：2024 · DOI：10.1111/1365-2745.14389 · 被引用次数：10 · 研究领域：Botany and Plant Ecology Studies、Plant Water Relations and Carbon Dynamics、Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies

Abstract Extreme drought and intensification of land use pose substantial threats to ecosystem stability. However, existing studies that assess ecosystem stability focus primarily on the stability of aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP), while the stability of belowground net primary productivity (BNPP) is often not considered. Here, we examined the response patterns and drivers of ANPP stability and BNPP stability in an alpine meadow to drought and clipping (simulating grazing and mowing) by the implementation of five levels of simulated precipitation (1/12, 1/4, 1/2, 3/4 and ambient precipitation) and clipping (unclipped vs. clipped) treatments over 7 years (2016–2022). The results showed that extreme drought decreased ANPP stability, while moderate drought increased BNPP stability and net primary productivity stability. The findings highlight the importance of jointly considering above‐ and belowground processes when evaluating ecosystem stability. Moreover, clipping did not have an impact on ANPP stability but reduced BNPP stability, and clipping differentially affected the stability of ANPP and BNPP in response to extreme drought. Furthermore, ANPP stability was largely determined by species temporal asynchrony rather than richness, whereas dominant species stability strongly contributed to the variation in BNPP stability of this alpine meadow faced with drought and clipping. Synthesis : In general, these results provide experimental evidence for the decoupling of...