The Effect Of Genotypic Diversity On Litter Decomposition Of Solidago Canadensis

The relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning has been noticed for a long time, and has aroused considerable interest in recent decades. Leaf traits, which predominantly control litter decomposition rates, are known to be partly genetically determined. Therefore, genotypic diversity of leaf litters may affect the decompostion, which has been observed in some native plant species. A direct inference is that such a genotypic diversity effect may also hold in alien species. In this paper, we aimed to test whether the genotypic diversity also promote decomposition of leaf litters of alien species. We set up an experiment including four genotypic levels (1-, 3-, 6-, or 12-genotypes per patch) to test this hypothesis using Solidago canadensis, a notorious invasive species in China.After five months of litter decomposition experiment, we found that genotypic diversity can accelerate decomposition. The remaining mass of litter was 29.65% higher in single-genotype bag than in 12-genotype bag. Our study suggested that the positive effect of genotypic diversity on plant litter decomposition initially arised as a result of selection effects, but a transition from selection to complementarity occured after a time log. We found that leaf litters of multiple genotypes supported significantly higher species richness and more individuals of soil animals than those of single genotype. For example, the number of groups of soil animals of 3-, 6-, and 12-genotypes bags were 14.29%,30.61% and 22.45% more than in 1-genotype bag, respectively. The potnetial mechamism was resource specialization. Our results also showed that plant genotypic diversity may have an impact on nutrient release, which likely has important consequences for the cycling and spatial distribution of nutrients at the landscape level.