Fig 1.
Location of the study area and experimental sites.
Fig 2.
Monthly precipitation (bars) and monthly mean air temperature (line) for 2010–2012.
Table 1.
Response of soil temperature during the plant growing season (T), soil gravimetric water content (SW), aboveground primary productivity (ANPP), belowground primary productivity (BNPP) and soil respiration (Rs) to grassland management practices over 3 years in the semiarid grassland.
Fig 3.
Effects of grazing, clipping, and enclosure on aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) and belowground net primary productivity (BNPP) 2010–2012 (inset mean ± SE).
Fig 4.
Diurnal variations in soil temperature (a, c, e) and soil respiration (b, d, f) under grazing, clipping, and enclosure on August 6–7, 2010, 2011 and 2012 (inset mean ± SE).
Fig 5.
Seasonal dynamics and mean (inset mean ± SE) of soil temperature (a, b, c), soil gravimetric water content (d, e, f), and soil respiration (g, h, i) for 2010–2012.
G: grazing, C: clipping, E: enclosure.
Fig 6.
Path analysis on the impacts of land management changes on soil respiration through affecting abiotic and biotic factors.
Solid and dashed arrows represent significant (P< 0.05, marked *; P< 0.01, marked **; P < 0.001, marked *** in the figure) and non-significant (P> 0.05) paths. Values associated with arrows represent standardized path coefficients. Tair: soil temperature; Wsoil: soil water content; ANPP: aboveground net primary production; BNPP: belowground net primary production; Rs: soil respiration.
Fig 7.
Temporal dependence of soil respiration on soil temperature (a), soil water content (b), ANPP (c) and BNPP (d) across the three growing seasons.
Fig 8.
Spatial dependence of seasonal mean soil respiration on soil temperature (a), soil water content (b), ANPP (c), and BNPP (d), across nine plots for 2010–2012.
Fig 9.
Spatial dependence of seasonal mean soil respiration of grazing, clipping, and enclosure on 10-cm soil temperature (a), 0–10-cm soil water content (b), ANPP (c), and BNPP (d), across nine plots.