Abstract
Nitrogen (N) resorption from senescing leaves is an important mechanism of N conservation for terrestrial plant species, but changes in N-resorption traits over wide-range and multi-level N addition gradients have not been well characterized. Here, a 3-year N addition experiment was conducted to determine the effects of N addition on N resorption of six temperate grassland species belonging to three different life-forms: Stipa krylovii Roshev. (grass), Cleistogenes squarrosa (T.) Keng (grass), Artemisia frigida Willd. (semishrub), Melissitus ruthenica C.W.Wang (semishrub and N-fixer), Potentilla acaulis L. (forb) and Allium bidentatum Fisch.ex Prokh. (forb). Generally, N concentrations in green leaves increased asymptotically for all species. N concentrations in senescent leaves for most species (5/6) also increased asymptotically, except that the N concentration in senescent leaves of A. bidentatum was independent of N addition. N-resorption efficiency decreased with increasing N addition level only for S. krylovii and A. frigida, while no clear responses were found for other species. These results suggest that long-term N fertilization increased N uptake and decreased N-resorption proficiency, but the effects on N-resorption efficiency were species-specific for different temperate grassland species in northern China. These inter-specific differences in N resorption may influence the positive feedback between species dominance and N availability and thus soil N cycling in the grassland ecosystem in this region.
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Acknowledgments
We thank the staff of Duolun Restoration Ecology Research Station, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) for providing meteorological data, Mr. G.J. Wang for the maintenance of the field experimental plot. We also thank Stephen Hart for kindly correcting the English language of the manuscript. This study was supported by the State Key Basic Research Development Program of China (2007CB106800), two general grants (30600076, 30670347) from the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the Knowledge Innovation Major Project of CAS (KZCX2-XB2-01) and the State Science & Technology Promotion Program (2006bad16b01).
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Huang, JY., Zhu, XG., Yuan, ZY. et al. Changes in nitrogen resorption traits of six temperate grassland species along a multi-level N addition gradient. Plant Soil 306, 149–158 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-008-9565-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-008-9565-9