Data for: Male, female and mixed-sex poplar plantations support divergent soil microbial communities

Mixed-species forests are often more productive than monocultures because of a lower niche overlap and higher taxonomic and functional diversity of soil microbial communities. Males and females of dioecious plants have sex-specific adaptations to diverse habitats. The potential of using sexual differences in establishing more diverse poplar plantations has not been explored in degraded areas. We conducted a series of greenhouse and field experiments to investigate how belowground competition, soil microbial communities and seasonal variation nitrogen content differ among female, male and mixed-sex Populus cathayana plantations. In the greenhouse experiment, female neighbors suppressed the growth of males under optimal nitrogen conditions. However, male neighbors enhanced δ15N of females under inter-sexual competition. In the field, the root length density, root area density and biomass of fine roots were lower in female plantations than in male or mixed-sex plantations. Bacterial networ..., The four experiments as following:
Experiment 1. Plant-plant competition under different N levels
To investigate the effects of the sex identity on the growth of neighboring plants, one-year-old cuttings were sampled from male and female plantations and then cultivated in pots in a naturally-lit greenhouse at the Hangzhou Normal University (30°17′N, 120°0′E). Thereafter, cultivated plants of a similar size were randomly chosen and transplanted in plastic pots (diameter 36 cm, height 27 cm). Each pot was filled with sand, vermiculite, and perlite (1:1:1). Each pot contained two rooted cuttings, either male-male, female-female, or male-female. Half of the plants were subject to an optimal N treatment (control) and half of the plants to a limited N treatment (N-). Each treatment had five replicates. The N levels were controlled with the Long Ashton solution (supplementary material for detailed information of the Long Ashton solution). After growing for 14 weeks, the plants were harvested, ..., , # Data for: Male, female and mixed-sex poplar plantations support divergent soil microbial communities

## Description of the data and file structure

The files contain primary data including Experiment 1, 2, 3 and 4, including C and N isotope, soil traits, root biomass, root N content, PLFA, nitrification rate, enzymes.

Data in sheet 1: Leaf δ13C and δ15N affected by plant-plant competition under different N availabilities, optimal (control) vs. limited. The NHF, NHM, NMM, NFF in the sheet1 indicated female in inter-sexual competition, male in inter-sexual competition, M in intra-sexual competition, and female in intra-sexual competition under control treatment. The HF, HM, MM, FF in the sheet1 indicated female in inter-sexual competition, male in inter-sexual competition, M in intra-sexual competition, and female in intra-sexual competition under nitrogen-limited treatment.

Data in sheet 2: SOM, soil organic matter; TN, total nitrogen; TP, total phosphorus; AP, available phosphoru...