Climate warming reduces the temporal stability of plant community biomass production

Anthropogenic climate change has emerged as a critical environmental problem, prompting frequent investigations into its consequences for various ecological systems. Few studies, however, have explored the effect of climate change on ecological stability and the underlying mechanisms. We conduct a field experiment to assess the influence of warming and altered precipitation on the temporal stability of plant community biomass in an alpine grassland located on the Tibetan Plateau. We find that whereas precipitation alteration does not influence biomass temporal stability, warming lowers stability through reducing the degree of species asynchrony. Importantly, biomass temporal stability is not influenced by…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Awards: 1257858, 1342754, DEB-1342754, DEB-1257858
• NN
  National Natural Science Foundation of China

  Awards: 31321061, 31630009, 31361123001, B14001
• HE
  Higher Education Discipline Innovation Project

  Award: B14001
• NK
  National Key Research and Development Program of China

  Awards: 2014CB954000, 31630009