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Abstract Human activities are enriching many of Earth’s ecosystems with biologically limiting mineral nutrients such as nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). In grasslands, this enrichment generally reduces plant diversity and increases productivity. The widely demonstrated positive effect of diversity on productivity suggests a potential negative feedback, whereby nutrient‐induced declines in diversity reduce the initial gains in productivity arising from nutrient enrichment. In addition, plant productivity and diversity can be inhibited by accumulations of dead biomass, which may be altered by nutrient enrichment. Over longer time frames, nutrient addition may increase soil fertility by increasing soil organic matter and nutrient pools. We examined the effects of 5–11 yr of nutrient addition at 47 grasslands in 12 countries. Nutrient enrichment increased aboveground live biomass and reduced plant diversity at nearly all sites, and these effects became stronger over time. We did not find evidence that nutrient‐induced losses of diversity reduced the positive effects of nutrients on biomass; however, nutrient effects on live biomass increased more slowly at sites where litter was also increasing, regardless of plant diversity. This work suggests that short‐term experiments may underestimate the long‐term nutrient enrichment effects on global grassland ecosystems.
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Effects of Multiple Resource Additions on Community and Ecosystem Processes: NutNet NPP Quadrat Sampling at the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge, New Mexico
Two of the most pervasive human impacts on ecosystems are alteration of global nutrient budgets and changes in the abundance and identity of consumers. Fossil fuel combustion and agricultural fertilization have doubled and quintupled, respectively, global pools of nitrogen and phosphorus relative to pre-industrial levels. In spite of the global impacts of these human activities, there have been no globally coordinated experiments to quantify the general impacts on ecological systems. This experiment seeks to determine how nutrient availability controls plant biomass, diversity, and species composition in a desert grassland. This has important implications for understanding how future atmospheric deposition of nutrients (N, S, Ca, K) might affect community and ecosystem-level responses. This study is part of a larger coordinated research network that includes more than 40 grassland sites around the world. By using a standardized experimental setup that is consistent across all study sites, we are addressing the questions of whether diversity and productivity are co-limited by multiple nutrients and if so, whether these trends are predictable on a global scale.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1655499
- PAR ID:
- 10424113
- Publisher / Repository:
- Environmental Data Initiative
- Date Published:
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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