Plant community productivity and soil water are not resistant to extreme experimental drought in temperate grasslands but in the understory of temperate forests.

Autor: Herberich MM; Institute of Botany, Department of Integrative Biology and Biodiversity Research, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna, Gregor-Mendel-Straße 33, 1180 Vienna, Austria; Plant Ecology Group, Institute of Evolution and Ecology, University of Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 5, 72076 Tübingen, Germany. Electronic address: maximiliane.herberich@boku.ac.at., Schädle JE; Plant Ecology Group, Institute of Evolution and Ecology, University of Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 5, 72076 Tübingen, Germany., Tielbörger K; Plant Ecology Group, Institute of Evolution and Ecology, University of Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 5, 72076 Tübingen, Germany.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Science of the total environment [Sci Total Environ] 2023 Sep 15; Vol. 891, pp. 164625. Date of Electronic Publication: 2023 Jun 04.
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.164625
Abstrakt: Climate change is continuously intensifying droughts. Extreme droughts are expected to reduce soil water content and thus, ecosystem functioning such as above-ground primary productivity. Nonetheless, results of experimental drought studies vary from no impact to a significant decrease in soil water content and/or productivity. We experimentally imposed extreme drought as 30 % and 50 % precipitation reductions using rainout shelters for four years in temperate grasslands and in the forest understory. We studied the concurrent impact of two intensities of extreme drought on the soil water content and above-ground primary productivity in the last experimental year (resistance). Furthermore, we observed resilience as the extent to which both variables differ from ambient conditions after the removal of the 50 % reduction. We show a systematic difference in response to extreme experimental drought between grasslands and the forest understory irrespective of the intensity of the extreme drought. Namely, extreme drought resulted in a significant decrease of the soil water content and productivity in grasslands but not in the forest understory. Interestingly, the negative impacts in the grasslands did not persist as evidenced by the fact that soil water content and productivity were similar to ambient conditions after the removal of the drought. Our results indicate that extreme drought on small spatial scales does not necessarily result in a concurrent soil water decrease in the forest understory, while this is the case for grasslands, with respective consequences for the resistance of productivity. Grasslands, however, can be resilient. Our study highlights that considering the response of the soil water content is key to understanding divergent productivity responses to extreme drought among different ecosystems.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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