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1. Lianas account for a small fraction of forest biomass, but their contribution to leaf or litter biomass and thus to food webs can be substantial. Globally liana exhibit fast life-history traits. Thus, liana litter may decompose faster than tree litter, and could enhance the decomposition of tree litter (complementarity effect). The differences in decomposition may also vary with mesofauna access or across forest communities. The contribution of these factors to nutrient biogeochemical cycling is poorly understood. 2. We examined the decomposition of litter of 20 liana and 20 tree species of three different tropical forest communities in southern China, over 1 year. (i) We incubated the litter in bags with coarse and fine mesh to distinguish mesofaunal and microfaunal effects. (ii) We used single-species litter bags to compare decomposition rates of lianas and trees, to test which functional traits best explained decomposition, and whether those traits differed between lianas and trees, and among forest types. (iv) We used mixed-species litter bags to test whether liana litter enhances decomposition in litter mixtures. (v) We evaluated how leaf litter nutrients decayed in relation to litter mass. 3. Litter decayed faster in coarse-mesh than fine-mesh bags, but there was no interaction effect with forest type or growth form. Liana litter decayed faster than tree litter in single-species bags with mesofauna access and in mixed bags (liana-only mix, tree-only mix) without mesofauna. Lianas had higher nitrogen content and specific leaf area and lower leaf dry matter content (LDMC) and toughness than trees. Decomposition rate was significantly negatively related to LDMC. Litter of evergreen broadleaved forest decomposed slower than that of other forest types. Liana litter did not enhance the decomposition of tree litter in mixtures. Liana litter released calcium slightly faster than trees. 4. Synthesis: Leaf litter decomposes faster for lianas than trees, despite high variability of traits and decomposition rates within each growth form and overlap between growth forms, and we found no evidence for the complementarity hypothesis. Our study sheds light on the potential role of lianas within brown food webs and their importance on terrestrial biogeochemistry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The coupling of carbon cycle and nitrogen cycle drives the food web structure and biogeochemistry of an ecosystem. However, across precipitation gradients, there may be a shift in C pool and N pool from above- to belowground because of shifting plant stoichiometry and allocation. Based on previous evidence, biomass allocation to roots should increase with aridity, while leaf [N] should increase. If their effect sizes are equal, they should cancel each other out, and the above- and belowground proportions of the N would remain constant. Here, we present the first study to explicitly compare above- and belowground pool sizes of N and C within predominant plant species along precipitation gradients. Biomass and nutrient concentrations of leaves, stems and roots of three predominant species were measured along two major precipitation gradients in Inner Mongolia, China. Along the two gradients, the effect sizes of the biomass shifts were remarkably consistent among three predominant species. However, the size of the shift in aboveground [N] was not, leading to a species-specific pattern in above- and belowground pool size. In two species (Stipa grandis and Artemisia ordosica) the effect sizes of biomass allocation and [N] were equal and the proportion of N of above- and belowground did not change with aridity, but in S. bungeana the increase in leaf [N] with aridity was much weaker than the biomass shift, leading to a decrease in the proportion of N aboveground at dry sites. We have found examples of consistent N pool sizes above- and belowground and a shift to a greater proportion of belowground N in drier sites depending on the species.We suggest that precipitation gradients do potentially decouple the C and N pool, but the exact nature of the decoupling depends on the dominant species' capacity for intraspecific variation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The coupling of the carbon and nutrient cycles drives the food web structure and biogeochemistry of ecosystems. However, across precipitation gradients, there may be a shift in C and N pools from above- to belowground because of shifting plant stoichiometry and allocation. Here, we present a study which is the first to explicitly compare above- and belowground pool sizes of N and C within predominant plant species along precipitation gradient. We dissected these pools into biomass allocation and nutrient concentrations. Based on previous evidence, biomass allocation to roots should increase with aridity, while leaf [N] should increase. If their effect sizes are equal, they should cancel each other out, and the above- and belowground proportions of the N would remain constant. Along a precipitation gradient in Chinese steppe zone, the effect sizes of the biomass shifts were remarkably consistent among the predominant species, Stipa grandis. The effect sizes of biomass allocation and [N] were equal and the proportion of N of above- and belowground did not change with aridity, but the shift in leaf [C] with aridity was much weaker than the biomass shift, leading to a decrease in the proportion of C belowground at dry sites. Precipitation gradients do decouple the C and N pool of S. grandis along a precipitation gradient in Chinese steppe zone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aims: Long-term studies to disentangle the multiple, simultaneous effects of global change on community dynamics are a high research priority to forecast future distribution of diversity. Seldom are such multiple effects of global change studied across different ecosystems., Methods: Here we manipulated nitrogen deposition and rainfall at levels realistic for future environmental scenarios in three contrasting steppe types in Mongolia and followed community dynamics for 7 years., Key Results: Redundancy analyses showed that community composition varied significantly among years. Rainfall and nitrogen manipulations did have some significant effects, but these effects were dependent on the type of response and varied between ecosystems. Community compositions of desert and meadow steppes, but not that of typical steppe, responded significantly to rainfall addition. Only community composition of meadow steppe responded significantly to nitrogen deposition. Species richness in desert steppe responded significantly to rainfall addition, but the other two steppes did not. Typical steppe showed significant negative response of species richness to nitrogen deposition, but the other two steppes did not. There were significant interactions between year and nitrogen deposition in desert steppe and between year and rainfall addition in typical steppe, suggesting that the effect of the treatments depends on the particular year considered., Conclusions: Our multi-year experiment thus suggests that responses of community structure and diversity to global change drivers are ecosystem-dependent and that their responses to experimental treatments are dwarfed by the year-to-year community dynamics. Therefore, our results point to the importance of taking annual environmental variability into account for understanding and predicting the specific responses of different ecosystems to multiple global change drivers., (© The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Annals of Botany Company. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.)