More management is needed to improve the effectiveness of artificial grassland in vegetation and soil restoration on the three-river headwaters region of China

Nengyu Wang; Jiayi Wan; Mingjun Ding; Hua Zhang; Shicheng Li; Linshan Liu; Yili Zhang

doi:10.3389/fpls.2023.1152405

More management is needed to improve the effectiveness of artificial grassland in vegetation and soil restoration on the three-river headwaters region of China

Front Plant Sci. 2023 Apr 21:14:1152405. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2023.1152405. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Nengyu Wang¹, Jiayi Wan¹, Mingjun Ding^{1

2}, Hua Zhang^{1

2}, Shicheng Li³, Linshan Liu^{4

5}, Yili Zhang^{4

5}

Affiliations

¹ School of Geography and Environment, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang, China.
² Key Laboratory of Poyang Lake Wetland and Watershed Research, Ministry of Education, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang, China.
³ Department of Land Resource Management, School of Public Administration, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, China.
⁴ Key Laboratory of Land Surface Pattern and Simulation, Institute of Geographic Science and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
⁵ College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.

Abstract

Establishing an artificial grassland is a common measure employed to restore heavily degraded alpine grasslands for regional sustainability. The Three-River Headwaters Region in China has significant areas of black-soil-type grassland which is typified by heavy degradation; nearly 35% of the grassland regions in the Three-River Headwaters Region has degraded into this type. There are different plant community types of black-soil-type grasslands, however, it is not clear which restoration measures should be adopted for different kinds of black-soil-type grasslands. Here, we investigate the plant community characteristics and soil physicochemical properties of artificial grasslands, two types of black-soil-type grasslands, and native undegraded grassland in the Three-River Headwaters Region, then analyzed the direct and indirect interactions between the plant and soil properties by partial least squares path models (PLS-PM). Our results revealed that establishing artificial grassland significantly increased aboveground biomass and plant community coverage, and also decreased plant species richness and diversity and soil water content, soil organic carbon and total nitrogen in the 0-10 cm soil layer as compared with black-soil-type grasslands. Plant community diversity had a positive effect on plant community productivity, soil nutrient, and soil water content in native undegraded grassland. These results suggest that more management interventions are needed after establishing an artificial grassland, such as reducing dominant species in two types of black-soil-type grasslands, water regulation in the A. frigida-dominated meadow, diversifying plant species (i.e., Gramineae and sedges), and fertilizer addition.

Keywords: artificial grassland; degraded alpine grassland; partial least squares path models; plant-soil interaction; restoration management.

Grants and funding

This study was supported and funded by the second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research Program (Grant No. 2019QZKK0603) and Postgraduate Innovation Fund of the Education Department of Jiangxi Province (No. YC2021-S232).