HerbAdapt – Adaptation of understorey herbs to forest management

草本植物适应--林下草本植物对森林管理的适应性植物适应土地利用的研究通常是在受管理的草原生态系统的背景下进行的，而关于森林林下草本植物对森林管理的适应性的研究还很缺乏。这是令人惊讶的，因为森林管理对森林林下环境有很大的影响，特别是对光照和土壤水分条件，这可能会对森林林下草本植物施加强烈的限制。我预测，这种环境变化是不同的选择压力，导致表型性状分化和森林林下草本植物对森林经营的局部适应。在我的HerbAdapt项目中，我将执行两个常见的园艺实验--其中一个包括光和干旱处理--以及相互移植实验，以验证对多种常见森林林下草本植物(四种杂草，两种草)定殖率不同的预测。除了性能和功能性状外，我还将研究开花物候，因为它与森林管理有关，用于观测现场数据。我将把从常见的园艺实验中获得的表型性状平均值和对实验处理的性状反应与森林结构和小气候变量相关联。通过相互移植实验，我将采用沿着经营强度梯度的探索性尺度移植设计，明确地测试对森林经营的适应性。最后，我的项目将有助于理解森林管理对森林林下草本植物表型性状变异的影响。林下草本植物的表型性状变异是生物多样性的一个重要层次，是适应未来森林经营和全球气候变化的基础。

HerbAdapt – Adaptation of understorey herbs to forest managementPlant adaptation to land use has commonly been studied within the context of managed grassland ecosystems, whereas studies on the adaptation of forest understorey herbs to forest management are lacking. This is surprising because forest management has a strong impact on the forest understorey environment, especially on light and soil moisture conditions, which are likely to exert strong constraints on forest understorey herbs. I predict that this environmental variation acts as divergent selection pressure causing phenotypic trait differentiation and local adaptation of forest understorey herbs to forest management. In my project HerbAdapt I will perform two common garden experiments – one of them including a light and drought treatment – as well as a reciprocal transplant experiment to test this prediction for multiple common forest understorey herbs (four forbs, two grasses) varying in colonization rate. Besides performance and functional traits, I will investigate flowering phenology, because of its correlation with forest management for observational field data. I will correlate phenotypic trait means and trait responses to experimental treatments, obtained from the common garden experiments, with forest structure and microclimatic variables. With the reciprocal transplant experiment I will explicitly test for adaptation to forest management by adopting an Exploratory-scale transplant design along a management intensity gradient. Concluding, my project will contribute to understanding the impact of forest management on phenotypic trait variation in forest understorey herbs. Being an important level of biodiversity, phenotypic trait variation in forest understorey herbs forms the basis for adaptation to future changes in forest management and global climate.