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Inner Mongolia

Peer-reviewed Asia

Plants and mycorrhizal fungi responded differently to rainfall change—but their spatial variability converged under drought

Evidence
Peer-reviewed
Geography
Inner Mongolia, China
System
Temperate grassland

WHAT THE EVIDENCE SAYS

A field experiment compared ambient precipitation with 50% reductions and increases. Plant and arbuscular-mycorrhizal-fungal diversity responded differently, but their spatial compositional variability converged under reduced precipitation; AMF variation was driven primarily by abiotic soil filtering.

WHY IT MATTERS / OUR READ

Aboveground and belowground diversity do not have to move together even when drought reorganizes both communities. That complicates attempts to infer soil symbiont response from vegetation monitoring alone.

CAVEATS / UNCERTAINTY

The experiment represents one temperate-grassland system and a defined precipitation manipulation. Community-level sequencing and spatial-variability metrics do not directly establish changes in ecosystem function.

SOURCE

Journal of Plant Ecology — accepted precipitation experiment
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An Inner Mongolia precipitation experiment found plant and AMF diversity moving differently while reduced rainfall pushed both communities toward similar patterns of spatial compositional variability.

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Peer-reviewed

Light-to-moderate grazing maintained higher plant diversity than heavy grazing in an Inner Mongolia desert-steppe experiment

Evidence
Peer-reviewed
Geography
Inner Mongolia, China
System
Desert steppe and managed rangeland

WHAT THE EVIDENCE SAYS

A long-term grazing experiment compared ungrazed, light, moderate and heavy grazing treatments in desert steppe. Plant species and functional-diversity responses were strongest under light to moderate grazing, while soil nutrients and microbial-community measures also changed with grazing intensity rather than following one uniform response.

WHY IT MATTERS / OUR READ

Grazing is better treated as an intensity and objective problem than a binary presence-or-absence treatment. The response variable matters: vegetation diversity, production, soils and microbial condition may not identify the same 'best' grazing level.

CAVEATS / UNCERTAINTY

The result comes from one long-term experimental platform in a specific desert-steppe climate and soil context. Diversity is not identical to forage production, soil condition or wildlife habitat, and rainfall variability can alter treatment responses across years.

SOURCE

Global Ecology and Conservation
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A long-running grazing platform suggests neither complete exclusion nor heavy grazing maximized plant community diversity, while soil and microbial responses shifted on their own trajectories.

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