Ecological Processes

Table 1 Basic soil and plant characteristics along the grassland degradation gradient

From: Effect of grassland degradation on soil quality and soil biotic community in a semi-arid temperate steppe

	DG	MG	TG
Soil environment
Soil moisture (%)	19.92 ± 0.52c	35.23 ± 5.29b	55.45 ± 7.77a
Bulk density (g/cm³)	1.16 ± 0.01a	1.03 ± 0.05b	0.75 ± 0.06c
pH	6.67 ± 0.05b	6.93 ± 0.05a	6.21 ± 0.1c
Soil nutrient
Total C (g/kg)	29.30 ± 0.83b	31.33 ± 0.59b	75.45 ± 2.77a
Total N (g/kg)	2.92 ± 0.07b	2.79 ± 0.04b	5.94 ± 0.22a
Total P (g/kg)	0.46 ± 0.01b	0.46 ± 0.02b	0.97 ± 0.04a
Plant
Aboveground biomass (g/m²)	143.71 ± 23.29c	292.16 ± 26.46b	411.72 ± 20.11a
Belowground biomass (g/m²)	2866.81 ± 297.47	2570.06 ± 151.84	4447.15 ± 994.38
Root shoot ratio	24.83 ± 3.65a	9.26 ± 0.7b	11.24 ± 2.71b

DG degraded grassland, MG meadow steppe, TG the grassland from the forest-steppe ecotone
Means with different letters in the same row indicate significant differences at P < 0.05
Data are shown as mean ± SE

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