LTER

A 2-year experiment with ambient, reduced, and enhanced precipitation as well as nitrogen additions was designed to compare the performance of the  encroaching C3 shrub (honey mesquite Prosopis glandulosa) to the dominant C4 grass (black grama Bouteloua eriopoda) in terms of photosynthetic rates and leaf water status. Precipitation manipulations dramatically enhanced natural variability and generated a range of rainfall scenarios that could have only been studied only after a multi-decade effort using natural conditions.We use vegetation cover as a proxy for plant biomass to avoid confounding spatial and temporal variability or confounding the impact of harvesting.  Individual cover of plant species was measured  using three parallel transects per plot. This study is complete.

Increases in woody vegetation and declines in grasses in arid and semi-arid ecosystems have occurred globally since the 1800s, but the mechanisms driving this major land-cover change remain uncertain and controversial. Working in a shrub-encroached grassland in the northern Chihuahuan Desert where grasses and shrubs typically differ in leaf-level nitrogen allocation, photosynthetic pathway, and root distribution, we asked if differences in leaf level ecophysiology could help explain shrub proliferation. We predicted that the relative performance of grasses and shrubs would vary with soil moisture due to the different morphological and physiological characteristics of the two life-forms. In a 2-year experiment with ambient, reduced,and enhanced precipitation during the monsoon season, respectively, the encroaching C3 shrub (honey mesquite Prosopis glandulosa) consistently and substantially outperformed the historically dominant C4 grass (black grama Bouteloua eriopoda) in terms of photosynthetic rates while also maintaining a more favorable leaf water status. This data set includes leaf water potential for each leaf measured while data on photosynthetic rates can be found in package 210409001. This study is complete. Please refer to: Throop, H., Archer, S. R. , and L. G. Reichmann. 2011. Response of dominant grass and shrub species to water manipulation: an ecophysiological basis for shrub invasion in a Chihuahuan Desert Grassland. Oecologia 169: 373-383.

LTER-I Transect plant line intercept data. This data set is as transcribed (UNSORTED) from cassette tape with one intercept observation per record. Data consist of week number, transect, station, segment number, plant species, and length of species intercepted by line stretched between 2 rebar the length of the 30 meter plant line intercept transect. Measurements are made on 30-meter line intercept transects located perpendicular to each of 91 stations on each of the 2.7 km long Control, Treatment, and Alternate Control Transects established at the beginning of LTER-I. Each plant line transect is divided into 6 5-meter segments. Annuals are measured only in the first meter of segments 1, 2, and 3 and in the last meter of segments 4, 5, and 6. Perennials are measured for the full length of all segments. On March 19, 2000, an arson burn occurred of 2.5 acres of the upper grassland area on the Summerford bajada just below the powerline road. The area affected included portions of the LTER-I Transect Plant Line Intercept study that was begun in 1982. To evaluate the impact of the burn on those lines, the line intercepts were read for the upper grassland area extending from immediately above the creosotebush fringe to the base of Summerford Mountain. The stations measured were C73-C89, T75-T90, and X76-X91 (Control, Treatment, and Alternate Control, respectively). Measurements were made immediately after the burn, after the spring growing season, and after the fall growing season in 2000 only. In the initial sampling period, the burn area intercepted by the line was noted in the data set using a "species" code of BURN. BACKGROUND. In the spring of 1982, as part of the establishment of the Jornada Long-Term Ecological Research site in southern New Mexico, a 135 ha portion of a 1500 ha, internally drained, watershed was exclosed from grazing by domestic livestock. Prior to exclosure the watershed, as well as the rest of the Jornada basin, had been moderately to heavily grazed for the past 100 years. Concurrent with grazing, the vegetation had undergone a dramatic change from desert grassland, with an almost continuous cover of C4 perennial grasses, to isolated patches of the original grassland in a mosaic with desert shrub dominated plant communities (Buffington and Herbel, 1965). The exclosure lies along a northeast facing piedmont slope at the base of a steep isolated mountain peak, and covers a variety of component landforms from the foot of the mountain to the basin floor. This provided the opportunity to investigate the response of vegetation with respect to landscape characteristics as well as release from grazing.

This data set was collected to provide data for comparison of the losses of dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus in the runoff from grass- and shrub- dominated plots in the Jornada Basin of southern New Mexico. This summary dataset contains the following columns for the shrub plots: Plot: the identification number for the 6 grassland plots. Q: the mean rate of discharge during the entire experiment, obtained by dividing the total runoff by l800 sec. The units are cubic centimeters per second. Total N yield: the total yield of dissolved nitrogen discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment. The units are grams per square meter per l800 sec. This yield has been adjusted, by subtracting the content of total dissolved N applied in the simulated rainfall. Organic N yield: the yield of dissolved organic N, as above. Inorganic N yield: the yield of NH4-N plus NO3-N discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment, as above. Total P yield: the yield of total dissolved P discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment. The units are grams per square meter, per l800 sec. Organic P yield: the yield of dissolved organic P, as above. Inorganic P yield: the yield of PO4-P discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment. Fines: the percent of the plot surface covered by materials < 2.0 mm diameter Gravel: the percent of the plot surface covered by materials > 2.0 mm diameter Vegetation: the percent of the plot surface covered by vegetation. Litter: the percent of the plot surface covered by plant litter. Slope: it was not possible to measure slope in plots with a shrub in them, since the mound dominated the slope in the plot.

This data set was collected to provide data for comparison of the losses of dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus in the runoff from grass- and shrub- dominated plots in the Jornada Basin of southern New Mexico. This summary dataset contains the following columns for the grassland plots: Plot: the identification number for the 6 grassland plots. Q: the mean rate of discharge during the entire experiment, obtained by dividing the total runoff by l800 sec. The units are cubic centimeters per second. Total N yield: the total yield of dissolved nitrogen discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment. The units are grams per square meter per l800 sec. This yield has been adjusted, by subtracting the content of total dissolved N applied in the simulated rainfall. Organic N yield: the yield of dissolved organic N, as above. Inorganic N yield: the yield of NH4-N plus NO3-N discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment, as above. Total P yield: the yield of total dissolved P discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment. The units are grams per square meter, per l800 sec. Organic P yield: the yield of dissolved organic P, as above. Inorganic P yield: the yield of PO4-P discharged from the plot during the duration of the experiment. Fines: the percent of the plot surface covered by materials < 2.0 mm diameter Gravel: the percent of the plot surface covered by materials > 2.0 mm diameter Vegetation: the percent of the plot surface covered by vegetation. Litter: the percent of the plot surface covered by plant litter. Slope: the plot in degrees