Seasonal Dynamics Of Leaf Functional Traits In Artemisia Ordosica And Their Influencing Factors

Leaf functional traits can accurately reflect the response and adaptation mechanism of plants to environmental changes,and play an important role in plant ecology research.In this paper,seasonal dynamics in leaffunctional traits of Artemisia ordosica in response to environmental factors were studied over a whole growing season through long-term field oberservation.The goal is tounderstand adaptation characteristics of Artemisia ordosica dry environments,providing a theoretical basis for vegetation restoration and ecological restoration.The main results are as follows:(1)There was significant seasonal variation in specific leaf area(SLA),leaf area(LA),leaf nitrogen content(LNC),leaf carbon content(LCC),the leaf fresh weight(FW),dry weight(DW),leaf dry matter content(LDMC)and net photosynthetic rate(Pn).This variation indicatedacclimation to the varied environmental conditions in different seasons.(2)The dry matter content(LDMC)was positively correlated with photosynthetically active radiation(PAR).Humidity(RH)and soil nitrogen content(SNC)were negatively correlated.Leaf nitrogen content(LNC)was negatively correlated with temperature(Ta).Leaf carbon content(LCC)was positively related to relative humidity(RH),saturated vapor pressure difference(VPD)andsoil water content at 30 cm depth(SWC-30).The general ecological strategy in the growing season was that the specific leaf area,leaf nitrogen content and the net photosynthetic rate decreased and the leaf dry matter content and leaf weight increased as as temperature and radiation increased and relative humidity and soil moisture and nitrogen nutrient content decreased.The GLM model established for the functional traits in relation to environmental factors showed that the soil nitrogen content and soil water content were main environmental factors affecting the leaf functional traits in the growing season.(3)Specific leaf area(SLA)was positively correlated with leaf nitrogen content(LNC)and negatively related to leaf dry matter content(LDMC).Leaf carbon content(LCC)was positively correlated with leaf nitrogen content(LNC).Adaptation to the environment was through complementarity and tradeoffs between traits.The results of this study indicated that leaf functional traits of Artemisia ordosica had dynamic variability over growing season,and leaf functional traits were significantly correlated with the environments.Artemisia ordosicaachieved tradeoffsbetween its own physiological and structural traits to acclimate to changing environments.