Author(s): Fangfang Wang; Jiaguo Yan; Xu Ma; Dongdong Qiu; Baoshan Cui
Linked Author(s):
Keywords: Ecosystem functioning; Litter decay; Litter types; Spatial condition
Abstract: Most of the coastal vegetation enters the decomposer system as dead organic matter, and the subsequent recycling of biochemical elements and nutrients are key processes for the functioning of ecosystems. Although increasingly studies focused on how litter decomposition rates change among spatial contexts in the coastal ecosystem, a study to quantify how the changes in litter breakdown along a tidal gradient is unknown, in the Yellow River Estuary, Northern China. We experimentally manipulated the magnitude of litter of both Suaeda salsa and Spartina alterniflora to measure effects on the mass losses and the release of litter-bound nutrients vary with experimental conditions. We found that litter decomposition rates were linked to litter types and spatial condition. No matter in aerial condition or in surficial condition, the breakdown of S. salsa was faster than S. alterniflora and no matter the decomposition rates of S. salsa or the S. alterniflora, both of them in aerial condition were slower than in surficial condition. Along the tidal gradient, inundation frequency was lower, the litter decomposition rates were slower. We also found that there was a net release of P and a net immobilization of N of litters in surface and aerial decomposition. These results provide evidence that given the ubiquity of site dependence in nature, changes of the litter decay rate along the spatial environment would contribute to non-linear responses of ecosystem functioning across ecosystems.
Year: 2018