The DivResource Experiment
About The Project:
The DivResource Experiment is a grassland biodiversity experiment established in 2011 at the experimental field station Bad Lauchstädt. Although it is common knowledge that plant productivity and plant-plant interactions are affected by the environmental variation such as differences in resource availability, most biodiversity experiment have been performed under particular environmental conditions. Light and nutrients are major resources limiting plant growth in temperate grasslands. Therefore, the plant diversity gradient (1, 2, and 4 species) of the DivResource Experiment is orthogonally crossed with manipulations of light x nutrient availability (shading, fertilization). The species pool of the DivResource experiment represents different functional compositions (two functional groups grasses vs. forbs x two growth statures small vs. tall).
Major Research Questions:
After some years of research in the weeded experimental communities, we started to study the effects of our experimental treatments on community assembly after opening to colonization of new species. In 2019, we divided each experimental plot into four split plots to keep a weeded control and test for different scenarios of spontaneous and enforced colonization. In 2024, we stopped the experimental treatments of nutrient addition and shading to study the recovery of the experimental plant communities.