Journal
JOURNAL OF PLANT ECOLOGY
Volume 14, Issue 2, Pages 180-190Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/jpe/rtaa085
Keywords
biomass allocation; chlorophyll content; low-N tolerance; N use efficiency; plant invasiveness
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Funding
- Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China [2017YFC1200102]
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [31971552]
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The study found that invasive and native plant congeners can grow well at any NO3-/NH4+ ratios, and their responses in terms of growth, allocation, and tolerance were approximately parallel along the 11 NO3-/NH4+ ratios across two N levels. Plant invaders tend to grow larger, have higher chlorophyll contents, allocate more biomass to roots, and exhibit stronger low-N tolerance compared to their congeneric natives.
Aims Soil inorganic nitrogen (N) has long been recognized to play an important role in plant invasions. Whilst comparing the N use strategies of multiple invasive versus native plant congeners along an entire N gradient is key to understanding plant invasion success, there are few related studies. Methods We conducted a potted experiment with six invasive and native congeneric pairs, which were subjected to 11 nitrate/ammonium (NO3-/NH4+) ratios (i.e. 100% NO3- at one end and 100% NH4+ at the other end), each with low- and high-N levels. Each species-N combination was replicated eight times, and thus there were 2112 pots in total. We measured the following traits: the total biomass, growth advantage, biomass allocation, leaf chlorophyll content and low-N tolerance. Important Findings Invasive and native congeners grew well at any NO3-/NH4+ ratios, and their responses of growth, allocation and tolerance were approximately parallel along the 11 NO3-/NH4+ ratios across two N levels. Plant invaders grew larger and had greater chlorophyll contents, higher root biomass allocation and stronger low-N tolerance than their congeneric natives. These findings suggest that invasive and native plant congeners may utilize similar inorganic N forms (i.e. NO3- and NH4+) across an entire N composition gradient and that higher N use efficiencies could favor alien plants to invade new plant communities where congeneric natives are dominants.
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