Mass, C, N, and lignin from litter decomposed across a shrub gradient and with snow manipulations near Toolik Field Station between 2003 and 2009.

In arctic tundra near Toolik Lake, Alaska, we incubated a common substrate in a snow addition experiment to test whether snow accumulation around arctic deciduous shrubs altered the environment enough to increase litter decomposition rates. We compared the influence of litter quality on the rate of litter and N loss by decomposing litter from four different plant functional types in a common site. We used aboveground net primary production values and estimated k values from our decomposition experiments to calculate community-weighted mass loss for each site.

我们在阿拉斯加州图利克湖附近的北极苔原（arctic tundra）开展雪添加实验（snow addition experiment），以通用基质进行腐解培养，旨在探究北极落叶灌丛周边的积雪累积是否足以改变环境，进而提升凋落物分解（litter decomposition）速率。为对比凋落物质量对凋落物及氮（N）流失速率的影响，我们在统一试验场地内分解了四种不同植物功能型（plant functional types）的凋落物。此外，我们结合地上净初级生产力（aboveground net primary production）数值与本研究分解实验得到的估算分解速率常数（k值），计算得到各试验样地的群落加权质量损失（community-weighted mass loss）。