Dehui Li

Do soil phytoliths accurately represent plant communities in a temperate region? A case study of Northeast China

Modern soil phytoliths can potentially provide analogues for phytolith assemblages from archaeological and palaeoecological contexts. To assess the reliability of soil phytoliths for representing different plant communities, we analysed phytoliths in surface soils and parent plants at 65 sites representing five types of regional vegetation in Northeast China. The results demonstrated that surface soil phytolith assemblages could clearly differentiate samples from herbaceous and woody communities, and samples from Poaceae and non-Poaceae communities could be separated statistically. In addition, woody communities could be differentiated into a broadleaf-Poaceae community, a broadleaf-non-Poaceae community and a conifer and broadleaf-non-Poaceae community, except for some overlapping samples. Soil phytolith assemblages are thus able to differentiate regional vegetation types into different plant community types. In the present study, soil phytoliths represented about 30% of the phytoliths present in the aboveground vegetation. In addition, soil phytoliths from different communities reflected the aboveground vegetation with slightly different degrees of accuracy, and in addition different morphotypes exhibited different degrees of representational bias. Some morphotypes (e.g. rondel, elongate psilate, lanceolate) overrepresented the abundance of the associated plant taxa; morphotypes such as tracheid, conical epidermal, stomata and others under-represented the original plant richness; and other morphotypes, e.g. saddle, trapeziform sinuate, scutiform, were in good agreement with the numbers of plant taxa in the plot inventory. Thus, any quantitative palaeovegetation reconstruction using phytoliths should begin with the calibration of soil phytolith assemblages. We conclude that our findings provide improved phytolith analogues for different plant communities, with applications in palaeoenvironmental reconstruction, and they also provide additional insights into the mechanisms of phytolith production and deposition.

Holocene Artemisia-Chenopodiaceae-dominated grassland in North China: Real or imaginary?

The Songnen grasslands were traditionally thought to be dominated by Artemisia and Chenopodiaceae plants as early as the late Pleistocene. However, increasing evidence has called that interpretation into question. To shed new light on the paleovegetation evolution of the arid and semi-arid steppe in North China, phytolith assemblages preserved in the region’s sand-paleosol sequence (section Daike) are used as a proxy for paleovegetation structure. Results show that both the sand and paleosol layers in the Songnen grassland sections contain well-preserved phytoliths attributed to different families of grass. This is the first direct evidence of the nature of the vegetation that existed during the sandy layer episodes. Moreover, the phytolith evidence represented in the samples indicates that plant successions happened within the subfamilies of Poaceae through the time. Referring to phytoliths in modern plants and topsoils, and using statistical analyses, we propose that phytolith assemblages in the section Daike originated from Poaceae-dominant communities rather than an Artemisia-Chenopodiaceae ecosystem. The phytoliths, and evidence from the historical and modern pollen-vegetation relationships, lead to rejection of the hypothesis of a past widespread Artemisia-Chenopodiaceae ecosystem in the Songnen grasslands. Using published radiocarbon and thermoluminescence data, it is proposed that the present Poaceae-dominated grasslands developed as early as the early Holocene. This study also highlights the usefulness of phytolith analysis in paleovegetation reconstruction in arid and semi-arid lands.

Spatial and Temporal Distribution Differences Among Phytoliths of Phragmites Communis in Northeast China

Phragmites communis phytoliths were extracted from the xerophytic habitat of 12 sampling sites in northeast (NE) China during June–October in 2011 and 2012. The changes of P. communis phytolith concentrations in different temperature zones and growth stages were used to reveal the ecological environmental significance of P. communis phytoliths. The purpose of the study is to provide a scientific reference for quantitative reconstruction of paleoenvironment and studies of phytolith formation. The main phytolith types extracted from the 12 sampling sites and different growth stages were identical; however, the phytolith concentrations differed markedly. In NE China, from the temperate to the warm temperate zone, as temperature increased, the saddle phytoliths, bulliform phytoliths and the silicified stomata concentrations all increased, whereas the lanceolate phytolith concentration decreased. Moreover, in the humid, semi-humid and semi-arid areas, there were different responses of P. communis phytolith concentrations to temperature. Consequently, the spatial results showed that P. communis phytolith concentrations in NE China were closely related to temperature, which enabled inference of the change in temperature from phytolith concentration; however, they were also somewhat affected by humidity. During June–October, the temporal variation results of P. communis phytolith concentrations revealed that there were high lanceolate and bulliform phytolith concentrations in September or October; whereas the saddle phytolith concentration was high in July or August, and the maximum concentration for silicified stomata was in July. These findings may improve the understanding of phytolith formation, and provide useful information to further interpret phytolith assemblages in sediments.