Biomass allocation and productivity–richness relationship across four grassland types at the Qinghai Plateau

We harvested the AGB and BGB across 80 sites on the Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau once during summer (July to September) in 2011 and 2012. Five quadrats of 0.25 m2 (0.5 × 0.5 m) were sampled in the alpine meadow at each site (100 × 10 m) due to the abundant AGB in alpine meadow, and five quadrats of 1 m2 (1 ×1m) were sampled in the temperate grassland, desert grassland, and meadow steppe at each site.