The Effects Of Plateau Zokor Feeding-burrows Disturbance On Plant Community And Soil Nutrients

The plateau zokor is a small mammal that is living underground in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.It mainly affects alpine grassland directly or indirectly through activities such as underground-feeding,burrow system construction and murine mound building.The feeding-burrows are the main group of the tunnel system.It has a large number and distribution area,which have a certain concealment effect on grassland.On the one hand,the roots of plants growing on the vertical top of the feeding-burrows are easily eaten by plateau zokor.On the other hand,a large number of shallow feeding-burrows change the soil environment of the vertical apex,which will cause changes in plant growth performance at the top of the burrow.However,the domestic researches on the plateau zokor disturbing the alpine meadow mainly focuses on the rat mound effect,while little research has been done on the nature of plants and soils in the microbial communities.This study used Luqu and Xiahe as the object to compare and analyze the plant community characteristics and soil properties of the feeding-burrows area(vertical part of the feeding-burrows)and the non-burrows area(control).It is hoped that the influence of the disturbance of the plateau zokor feeding-burrows on the alpine grassland can be clarified.The main results are as follows:1.Feeding-burrows disturbance reduced the coverage and biomass of plant community,but the impact on plant diversity is differentThe results of both Luqu and Xiahe indicated that the disturbance of the feeding-burrows of the plateau zokor could significantly reduced the plant community coverage,aboveground biomass,belowground biomass,dry root biomass,diversity index and richness index in the tunnel area.There was a difference in the influence of the feeding-burrows on the plant uniformity index.The disturbance of the feeding-burrows reduced the uniformity index of the Xiahe area,but the effect on the Luqu uniformity index was not significant.At the same time,the influence of feeding-burrows disturbance on plant community height was not significant.2.There was a significant differentiation between the effects of feeding-burrows disturbance on the biomass and diversity of plant functional groupsThe disturbance of feeding-burrows significantly reduced the coverage of the functional groups of leguminosae and weeds and the height of the functional groups of the weeds in two locations,but the impact of the height and coverage of the functional groups of gramineae and cyperaceae was not significant.Feeding-burrows disturbance could reduce the aboveground biomass,belowground biomass and the ratio of above-ground biomass to belowground biomass which belonged to the functional groups of leguminosae and weeds.It is indicated that the disturbance of feeding-burrows is beneficial to the distribution of biomass of the functional groups of leguminosae and weeds to the belowground.At the same time,the influence of feeding-burrows disturbance on the aboveground biomass,belowground biomass and the ratio of above-ground biomass to belowground biomass of the functional groups of gramineae and cyperaceae was not significant.Feeding-burrows disturbances reduced the diversity index of the functional groups of leguminosae and weeds at the two sites,but significantly increased the evenness index of the functional group of gramineae.The effects of feeding-burrows disturbance on the richness index of each plant functional groups,the diversity index of the functional groups of cyperaceae,the uniformity index of the functional groups of leguminosae and cyperaceae were not significant.3.Feeding-burrows disturbance reduced soil bulk density and root-to-soil ratioBoth Xiahe and Luqu,the disturbance of the feeding-burrows of the plateau zokor significantly reduced soil bulk density,root-to-soil mass ratio and root-to-soil volume ratio,but had no significant effect on soil moisture.4.Feed tunnel interference reduced soil available phosphorus contentThe disturbance of the feeding-burrows of the plateau zokor significantly reduced the soil available phosphorus content in the Luqu and Xiahe regions,but had no significant effect on available potassium,ammonium nitrogen,nitrate nitrogen,organic carbon,total phosphorus,total potassium and total nitrogen.5.Disturbance of plateau zokor feeding-burrows changed the correlation between biomass of plant community and plant functional group biomass with soil bulk density,root-to-soil ratio and available phosphorusThe disturbance of the feeding-burrows of the plateau zokor caused the plant community biomass and the soil available phosphorus from the significant correlation to the insignificant correlation,which changed the plant community aboveground biomass to the root-to-soil volume ratio to a significant positive correlation.The disturbance of the feeding-burrows of the plateau zokor caused the correlation between biomass of the functional group of leguminosae and root-to-soil volume ratio to change from irrelevant to significant positive correlation.The significant difference between the functional group biomass and the available phosphorus content of the cyperaceae was not significantly correlated.There was no significant change in the correlation between the biomass of the functional group of the weeds and the soil bulk density,soil moisture,root-to-soil ratio and soil nutrient.In summary,The disturbance of feeding-burrows of plateau zokor reduced the coverage,biomass of plant community and soil bulk density,root-to-soil ratio and available phosphorus content.The plateau zokor feeding-burrows effects in different sites has same interference on plant community height,coverage,biomass,soil physical status and soil nutrient content.However,there are differences in the effects of plant diversity and biomass and diversity of plant functional groups.