Basic characteristics of <i>Stipa sareptana</i> var. <i>krylovii</i> communities in China

Community Differentiation and Ecological Influencing Factors along Environmental Gradients: Evidence from 1200 km Belt Transect across Inner Mongolia Grassland, China

“…In this study, we found that the above biomass mean of 1-m 2 plots was approximately 111.1 g•m 2 in the typical steppe, and 203.4 g•m 2 in the meadow steppe, respectively, indicating that the meadow steppe had higher productivity than that of the typical steppe. The above-ground biomass in the typical steppe was consistent with the study of Lu et al [40], while lower than the global above-ground biomass [41], indicating that more efforts in biodiversity conservation and grassland protection are needed. Furthermore, the research on the ecosystem functions and stability based on biomass will perhaps become a heated ecology topic in the future.…”

“…Previous studies have illustrated that the aboveground biomass in a community dominated by S. sareptana var. Krylovii was 111.61 g•m 2 , and the global above-ground biomass of 430.2 g•m 2 [40,41]. In this study, we found that the above biomass mean of 1-m 2 plots was approximately 111.1 g•m 2 in the typical steppe, and 203.4 g•m 2 in the meadow steppe, respectively, indicating that the meadow steppe had higher productivity than that of the typical steppe.…”

“…This conclusion was also mentioned in the basic characteristics of S. sareptana var. krylovii communities in China [40,45]. Additionally, the contribution rate of accumulated precipitation in the growing season to the differentiation of community characteristics was 63.6%, and the conditional effects were 42.5%, which proved that precipitation was the most critical factor driving the zonal distribution of vegetation in the typical steppe.…”

Figure 2 from: Liu C, Qiao X, Guo K, Zhao L, Pan Q (2022) Vegetation classification of Stipa steppes in China, with reference to the International Vegetation Classification. Vegetation Classification and Survey 3: 121-144. https://doi.org/10.3897/VCS.72875

“…However, this classification was mainly based on expert opinion, community distribution ranges and ecological context but not on a plot data-based numerical analysis. Only a few studies have investigated the community characteristics of a small number of Stipa steppe alliances and conducted an association classification based on dominant species (Yang et al 2014;Qiao et al 2017aQiao et al , b, 2020Zhao et al 2018;Zhu et al 2018;Lu et al 2020). Moreover, some Stipa species are very similar and hard to distinguish.…”