Abstract
Background and aims
The differences in multi-elemental concentrations among plant species provide insightful information for understanding species coexistence in forest ecosystems, known as the biogeochemical niche separation. As most of the studies focused on leaf elemental concentrations, it is unclear whether belowground fine roots exhibit biogeochemical niche separation and whether there are close linkages of elemental concentrations among leaves, fine roots and rhizosphere soils.
Methods
Nine element (N, P, K, Ca, Mg, Mn, Zn, Cu, and Fe) concentrations in leaves, fine roots and rhizosphere soils were measured for three tree species, three woody shrub species, and three herbaceous species in three subtropical plantations.
Results
Elemental concentrations in leaves and fine roots were significantly different between woody and herbaceous species. Notably, the elemental concentrations differed more significantly for leaves than for fine roots, which indicated that leaves, as the most metabolically active tissues, tended to maintain their unique elemental concentrations within a particular functional type. Despite the different elemental needs between leaves and fine roots, most elemental concentrations of leaves were closely associated with those of the fine roots, highlighting the relationship between leaf and root ecological processes. Elemental concentrations in leaves or fine roots were not significantly correlated with those of the rhizospheres.
Conclusions
There is evidence for biogeochemical niche separation between coexisting woody and herbaceous species to avoid competition. Our results generalized the biogeochemical niche hypothesis to belowground tissues, which offered new insights into a better understanding of species evolution and coexistence in ecosystems.
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Acknowledgments
We thank Xueli Mo, Yuqiu Gao, and Lijuan Shi for their assistance in field and laboratory work. We also thank the academic editor and anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments, which helped to improve the manuscript. This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31971634, 41830860, 31700415), the Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province (1808085QC60), the Anhui Provincial Education Department (KJ2017A322), and the Start-up Research Fund of Anhui Normal University (2016XJJ115).
Funding
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31971634, 41830860, 31700415), the Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province (1808085QC60), the Anhui Provincial Education Department (KJ2017A322), and the Start-up Research Fund of Anhui Normal University (2016XJJ115). Author X.D. has received research support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31971634, 41830860). Author Y.Y. has received research support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31700415), the Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province, the Anhui Provincial Education Department and Anhui Normal University.
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X.D. and H.W. designed the study; X.D. and Y.Y. formed the experiments and collected the data; Y.Y. analyzed the data and led the writing of the manuscript. All authors gave final approval for publication.
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Yuan, Y., Wang, H. & Dai, X. Aboveground and belowground biogeochemical niche separation between woody and herbaceous species explains their coexistence in subtropical plantations. Plant Soil (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-024-06546-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-024-06546-5