Plant and soil biodiversity is essential for supporting highly multifunctional forests during Mediterranean rewilding

12 páginas.- 5 figuras.- referencias.- Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.https://fesummaries.wordpress.com/2022/11/15/multidimensional-change-of-biodiversity-and-ecosystem-functions/

The multidimensional dynamics of biodiversity and ecosystem function during the rewilding of Mediterranean forests remain poorly understood, limiting our capacity to predict how future restoration efforts may help mitigate climate change. Here, we investigated the changes in multiple dimensions of biodiversity and ecosystem services in a 120-year forest succession after harvest to identify potential trade-offs in multiple dimensions of ecosystem function, and further assess the link between above and below-ground biodiversity and function. We found a positive influence of successional age on not only multiple dimensions of biodiversity and function but also some important trade-offs. Two ecosystem axes of function explained nearly 75.4% of functional variation during ecosystem rewilding. However, while the first axis increased with successional age promoting plant productivity and element stocks, the second axis followed a hump-shaped relationship with age supporting important reductions in nutrient availability and pathogen control in old forests. Our study further revealed a significant positive relationship between plant and soil biodiversity with multiple elements of multifunctionality as forests develop. Moreover, the influence of plant and soil biodiversity were especially important to support a high number of function working at high levels of functioning. Our work provides new insights on the patterns and functional trade-offs in the multidimensional rewilding of forests and further highlights the importance of biodiversity for long-term Mediterranean rewilding.

This research was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 31930072, 31770559), Postdoctoral Innovation Talents Program of China (grant no. BX20200133) and the Castilla La Mancha Regional Government (project number POII10-0112- 7316). S.E.L was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 32101491), fellowship of China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2022T150375, 2021M701968). M.D-B. acknowledges support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation for the I+D+i project PID2020-115813RA-I00 funded by MCIN/AEI/https://doi.org/10.13039/ 50110 0011033. M.D.-B. is also supported by a project of the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER) and the Consejería de Transformación Económica, Industria, Conocimiento y Universidades of the Junta de Andalucía (FEDER Andalucía 2014-2020 Objetivo temático ‘01—Refuerzo de la investigación, el desarrollo tecnológico y la innovación’) associated with the research project P20_00879 (ANDABIOMA).

Peer reviewed