Soil properties as key predictors of global grassland production: Have we overlooked micronutrients?

Dajana Radujković; Erik Verbruggen; Eric W Seabloom; Michael Bahn; Lori A Biederman; Elizabeth T Borer; Elizabeth H Boughton; Jane A Catford; Matteo Campioli; Ian Donohue; Anne Ebeling; Anu Eskelinen; Philip A Fay; Amandine Hansart; Johannes M H Knops; Andrew S MacDougall; Timothy Ohlert; Harry Olde Venterink; Xavier Raynaud; Anita C Risch; Christiane Roscher; Martin Schütz; Maria Lucia Silveira; Carly J Stevens; Kevin Van Sundert; Risto Virtanen; Glenda M Wardle; Peter D Wragg; Sara Vicca

doi:10.1111/ele.13894

Soil properties as key predictors of global grassland production: Have we overlooked micronutrients?

Ecol Lett. 2021 Dec;24(12):2713-2725. doi: 10.1111/ele.13894. Epub 2021 Oct 6.

Authors

Dajana Radujković¹, Erik Verbruggen¹, Eric W Seabloom², Michael Bahn³, Lori A Biederman⁴, Elizabeth T Borer², Elizabeth H Boughton⁵, Jane A Catford⁶, Matteo Campioli¹, Ian Donohue⁷, Anne Ebeling⁸, Anu Eskelinen^{9

10

11}, Philip A Fay¹², Amandine Hansart¹³, Johannes M H Knops¹⁴, Andrew S MacDougall¹⁵, Timothy Ohlert¹⁶, Harry Olde Venterink¹⁷, Xavier Raynaud¹⁸, Anita C Risch¹⁹, Christiane Roscher^{9

10}, Martin Schütz¹⁹, Maria Lucia Silveira²⁰, Carly J Stevens²¹, Kevin Van Sundert¹, Risto Virtanen¹¹, Glenda M Wardle²², Peter D Wragg², Sara Vicca¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Biology, Plants and Ecosystems, University of Antwerp, Wilrijk, Belgium.
² Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA.
³ Department of Ecology, University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria.
⁴ Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, USA.
⁵ Archbold Biological Station, Buck Island Ranch Agroecology Program, Lake Placid, Florida, USA.
⁶ Department of Geography, King's College London, London, UK.
⁷ Department of Zoology, School of Natural Sciences, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland.
⁸ Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University Jena, Jena, Germany.
⁹ Physiological Diversity, UFZ, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Leipzig, Germany.
¹⁰ German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Leipzig-Jena, Leipzig, Germany.
¹¹ Ecology & Genetics, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland.
¹² USDA-ARS Grassland Soil and Water Research Laboratory, Temple, Texas, USA.
¹³ Département de biologie, CNRS, UMS 3194, Centre de recherche en écologie expérimentale et prédictive (CEREEP-Ecotron IleDeFrance), Ecole normale supérieure, PSL University, Saint-Pierre-lès-Nemours, France.
¹⁴ Department of Health and Environmental Sciences, Xián Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Suzhou, China.
¹⁵ Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
¹⁶ Department of Biology, 1 University of New Mexico, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA.
¹⁷ Department of Biology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium.
¹⁸ UPEC, Institute of Ecology and Environmental Sciences-Paris, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, IRD, INRAE, Université de Paris, Paris, France.
¹⁹ Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
²⁰ Range Cattle Research and Education Center, University of Florida, Ona, Florida, USA.
²¹ Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK.
²² School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

PMID: 34617374
DOI: 10.1111/ele.13894

Abstract

Fertilisation experiments have demonstrated that nutrient availability is a key determinant of biomass production and carbon sequestration in grasslands. However, the influence of nutrients in explaining spatial variation in grassland biomass production has rarely been assessed. Using a global dataset comprising 72 sites on six continents, we investigated which of 16 soil factors that shape nutrient availability associate most strongly with variation in grassland aboveground biomass. Climate and N deposition were also considered. Based on theory-driven structural equation modelling, we found that soil micronutrients (particularly Zn and Fe) were important predictors of biomass and, together with soil physicochemical properties and C:N, they explained more unique variation (32%) than climate and N deposition (24%). However, the association between micronutrients and biomass was absent in grasslands limited by NP. These results highlight soil properties as key predictors of global grassland biomass production and point to serial co-limitation by NP and micronutrients.

Keywords: N deposition; Nutrient Network (NutNet); biomass production; climate; grasslands; iron; micronutrients; soil properties; zinc.

MeSH terms

Biomass
Carbon
Ecosystem
Grassland*
Micronutrients
Nitrogen / analysis
Soil*

Substances

Micronutrients
Soil
Carbon
Nitrogen

Abstract

MeSH terms

Substances

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