Vegetation-based bioindication of humus forms in coniferous mountain forests

作     者：Kerstin ANSCHLAG Dylan TATTI Niels HELLWIG Giacomo SARTORI Jean-Michel GOBAT Gabriele BROLL 

作者机构：Institute of GeographyUniversity of OsnabrueckSeminarstrafte 19ab49074 OsnabrueckGermany Functional Ecology LaboratoryUniversity of NeuchatelRue Emile-Argand 112000 NeuchatelSwitzerland School of AgriculturalForest and Food Sciences HAFLBern University of Applied SciencesLanggasse 853052 ZollikofenSwitzerland MUSECorso del Lavoro e della Scienza 338122 TrentoItaly 

出 版 物：《Journal of Mountain Science》 (山地科学学报（英文）)

年 卷 期：2017年第14卷第4期

页      面：662-673页

核心收录：

学科分类：09[农学] 0903[农学-农业资源与环境] 090301[农学-土壤学] 

基　　金：funded by the German Research Foundation(DFG)(Grant No.Br1106/23-1) the Swiss National Science Foundation(SNF)(Grant No.205321L_141186) the Austrian Science Fund(FWF) 

主　　题：Landolt indicator values OH horizon Forest ecosystem Montane forest, Italian Alps 

摘      要：Humus forms, especially the occurrence and the thickness of the horizon of humified residues （OH）, provide valuable information on site conditions. In mountain forest soils, humus forms show a high spatial variability and data on their spatial patterns is often scarce. Our aim was to test the applicability of various vegetation features as proxy for OH thickness. Subalpine coniferous forests dominated by Picea abies （L.） H. Karst. and Larix decidua Mill. were studied in the Province of Trento, Italian Alps, between ca. 900 and 22o0 m a.s.1. Braun-Blanquet vegetation relevds and OH thickness were recorded at 152 plots. The vegetation parameters, tested for their suitability as indicators of OH thickness, encompassed mean Landolt indicator values of the herb layer （both unweighted and cover-weighted means） as well as parameters of vegetation structure （cover values of plant species groups） calculated from the releves. To our knowledge, the predictive power of Landolt indicator values （LIVs） for humus forms had not been tested before. Correlations between OHthickness and mean LIVs were strongest for the soil reaction value, but indicator values for humus, nutrients, temperature and light were also significantly correlated with OH thickness. Generally, weighting with species cover reduced the indicator quality of mean LIVs for OH thickness. The strongest relationships between OH thickness and vegetation structure existed in the following indicators： the cover of forbs （excluding graminoids and ferns） and the cover of Erieaeeae in the herb layer. Regression models predicting OH thickness based on vegetation structure had almost as much predictive power as models based on LIVs. We conclude that LIVs analysis can produce fairly reliable information regarding the thickness of the OH horizon and, thus, the humus form. If no releve data are readily available, a field estimation of the cover values of certain easily distinguishable herb layer species groups is much faster than