Changes of plant community diversity and soil ecological stoichiometry in alpine meadow under the disturbance of plateau pika Ochotona curzoniae and plateau zokor Myospalax baileyi
In order to clarify the changes of plant community and soil characteristics in alpine meadow disturbed by plateau pika Ochotona curzoniae and plateau zokor Myospalax baileyi,the plateau pika and plateau zokor co-existed areas with different interference intensities were selected in the alpine meadow area of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. The plant community structure was investigated,the soil chemical properties were determined,and the relationship among plateau pika and plateau zokor inter-ference and plant community and soil chemical factors was analyzed by redundancy analysis. The re-sults showed that the coverage and evenness index of plant communities in the mixed occurrence area were significantly lower than those in the single occurrence area of plateau pika,and there was no sig-nificant difference in other plant communities and soil indexes between the two investigation intervals. With the increase of population density in the plateau pika occurrence area,the plant species richness in-dex (95％confidence interval (CI):0.355-0.853) increased significantly,while the plant height (95％CI:1.006-1.566) and soil organic carbon content (95％CI:7.270-16.270) decreased significantly. With the in-crease of disturbance intensity in the mixed occurrence area,the community plant height (95％CI:0.088-1.093),soil total nitrogen content (95％CI:-0.140-0.240) and soil ammonium nitrogen content (95％CI:0.146-1.109) increased significantly,while the plant community richness (95％CI:0.168-0.858) de-creased significantly. This indicates that the impact of the co-occurrence of plateau pika and plateau zo-kor on grassland plant communities and soil chemical properties is greater than that of plateau pika alone. It was recommended that attention should be focused on the distribution and damage situation in areas where both species co-exist for controlling small mammal pests. Appropriate control measures should be formulated based on the severity of the damage to prevent further degradation of the grasslands.
万方数据
维普
