Effect Of Different Habitat On Leaf Litter Decomposition In Alpine Meadow

Litter decomposition in alpine meadow is a important process of the alpine meadow ecological cycle. Decomposition of plant litter play an important role in three major functions: alpine meadow ecosystem material cycle、energy flowing、 information transmission. Decomposition of alpine meadow litter is a main source of meadow soil nutrition, is the foundation of maintain soil fertilization.Litter release nutrition to soil after its decomposition,and the process of itself is main way for alpine meadow litter nutrition return, therefore,there are very significant meaning for us to do some research on plant litter decomposition. In natural world plant litter decomposition mainly influenced by the interior factors and external factors. Interior factors usually include concentrations of the chemicals elements (nitrogen、phosphor, carbon、 cellulose、lignin、phenolics,etc.)in leaf liteer. External factors usually imply environmental factors like temperature、humidity、soil、elevation gradient、lighting and so on.In this experiment,we through studies the effect of different habitat (typical meadow、marsh meadow)、different species to initial litter chemistry concentrations and the initial litter chemistry concentration’s correlation with litter decomposition rate,after that we can make a more clear analysis to make sure that the decomposition rate of litter is direct effect by environmental factors or indirect effect by use environmental factors change initial litter chemistry concentrations to make the litter decomposition rate have change. In this experiment we compared the decomposition rate of same species in different habitat and find that decomposition rate of the typical meadow is higher than marsh meadow significantly. By means of Paired-samples Ttest,we fond:different habitat have no notable effect on nitrogen concentration, C:N of leaf litter, P>0.05,but different habitat have notable effect on phosphor、cellulose、lignin concentration of leaf litter,P<0.05. Therefore,we consider that different habitat will impact the initial litter chemistry concentrations. After analysis the correlation of initial litter chemistry concentrations and litter decomposition rate in same habitat, we comes to a conclusion that different chemical element have different effect on litter decomposition rate, concentrations of nitrogen、lignin、cellulose、C:N、 C:P have significant correlation with mass loss rate,P<0.05,and only nitrogen performance positive correlation in this study. Concentrations of phosphor have little correlation with litter decomposition rate,P>0.05, have no significant correlation.For all we had before,we come to a conclusion:decomposition of alpine meadow litter is a complex, dynamic, and with interaction of various biological factors’s process. Environmental factors in the habitat and chemical element content of different species are main factors influence the rate of litter decomposition, environmental factors and species’s chemical concentration directly affect the decomposition rate of litter. When it is in the same ecological environment of the litter decomposition, nutrient contents of litter is main influence factors of the litter decomposition rate.