Volume 245, Issue 1 p. 130-140
Full paper

Strong nestedness and turnover effects on stand productivity in a long-term forest biodiversity experiment

Lan Zhang

Lan Zhang

State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China

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Bernhard Schmid

Bernhard Schmid

Remote Sensing Laboratories, Department of Geography, University of Zurich, CH-8006 Zurich, Switzerland

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Franca J. Bongers

Franca J. Bongers

Centre for Crop Systems Analysis, Wageningen University, 6700 HB Wageningen, the Netherlands

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Shan Li

Shan Li

State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China

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Goddert von Oheimb

Goddert von Oheimb

Institute of General Ecology and Environmental Protection, TUD Dresden University of Technology, 01737 Tharandt, Germany

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Keping Ma

Keping Ma

State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China

College of Resources and Environment, University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100049 Beijing, China

Zhejiang Qianjiangyuan Forest Biodiversity National Observation and Research Station, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China

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Xiaojuan Liu

Corresponding Author

Xiaojuan Liu

State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China

College of Resources and Environment, University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100049 Beijing, China

Zhejiang Qianjiangyuan Forest Biodiversity National Observation and Research Station, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100093 Beijing, China

China National Botanical Garden, 100093 Beijing, China

Author for correspondence:

Xiaojuan Liu

Email:[email protected]

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First published: 23 October 2024

Summary

  • Multispecies planting is an important approach to deliver ecosystem functions in afforestation projects. However, the importance of species richness vs specific species composition in this context remains unresolved.
  • To estimate species or functional group richness and compositional change between two communities, we calculated nestedness, where one community contains a subset of the species of another, and turnover, where two communities differ in species composition but not in species richness. We evaluated the effects of species/functional group nestedness and turnover on stand productivity using 315 mixed plots from a pool of 40 tree species in a large forest biodiversity experiment in subtropical China.
  • We found that the greater the differences in species or functional group nestedness and turnover, the greater the differences in stand productivity between plots. Additionally, the strong effects of both nestedness and turnover on stand productivity developed over the 11-yr observation period.
  • Our results indicate that selection of specific tree species is as important as planting a large number of species to support the productivity function of forests. Furthermore, the selection of specific tree species should be based on functionality, because beneficial effects of functional group composition were stronger than those of species composition.

Data availability

All data in the analyses are available at Figshare (doi: 10.6084/m9.figshare.27173751).