maintainer: EnviDat

en: csv meteorological-data-format nead metadata-convention research-data-management

en: MeteoIO (future reference implementation)

en: NEAD syntax v0.1 (EBNF)

media_type: text/plain

mimetype: text/plain

en: NEAD on GitHub

media_type: HTML

en: PyNEAD (future reference implementation)

en:
Acknowledgement: The NEAD format includes NetCDF metadata and is proudly inspired by both SMET and NetCDF formats. NEAD is designed as a long-term data preservation and exchange format.

The NEAD specifications were presented at the "WMO Data Conference 2020 - Earth System Data Exchange in the 21st Century" (Virtual Conference).

-----------------------

Summary:
The Non-Binary Environmental Data Archive (NEAD) format is being developed as a generic and intuitive format that combines the self-documenting features of NetCDF with human readable and writeable features of CSV. It is designed for exchange and preservation of time series data in environmental data repositories.

License: The NEAD specifications are released to the public domain under a Creative Commons CC0 "No Rights Reserved" international license. You can reuse the information contained herein in any way you want, for any purposes and without restrictions.

csv

display_name: csv

metadata-convention

display_name: metadata-convention

meteorological-data-format

display_name: meteorological-data-format

nead

display_name: nead

research-data-management

display_name: research-data-management

education

en: Education and science

envidat

en: EnviDat: the Environmental Data Portal

en: Non-Binary Environmental Archive Data (NEAD) format


maintainer: EnviDat Support

en: wagital snow gcos snow-water-equivalent meteodat-gmbh

state: active

type: dataset

media_type: TXT

format: TXT

en:
Total water reserves of the snow cover [mio m3] for Wägital catchment, Switzerland, for reference date April 1. Data is separated in 2 elevation zones 900m-1500m asl and 1500m-2300m asl. Time period 1943-2022, status 2022-04-20.

Funded currently or in the past by:

- Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss in the context of GCOS Switzerland
- Meteodat GmbH
- Institute of Geography, University of Zurich
- WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF
- Institute of Geography, ETH Zurich (IAC ETH Zurich)
- AG Kraftwerk Wägital (AXPO and EWZ)

See also https://www.meteodat.ch/waegital.html

gcos

display_name: gcos

meteodat-gmbh

display_name: meteodat-gmbh

snow

display_name: snow

snow-water-equivalent

display_name: snow-water-equivalent

wagital

display_name: wagital

education

fr: Education, science

de: Bildung, Wissenschaft

it: Formazione e scienza

fr: EnviDat: le portail de données environnementales

de: EnviDat: das Umwelt-Datenportal

it: EnviDat: il portale dei dati ambientali

fr: EnviDat est le portail de données du WSL; il offre un accès uniformisé et réglementé aux données de surveillance et de recherche en matière d’environnement. Ce portail est capable d’héberger et de publier des ensembles de données précieuses et uniques, qui sont partagées aux quatre coins de la planète. Ce faisant, EnviDat favorise la recherche et contribue à l’avancement des sciences environnementales.

en: EnviDat is the WSL data portal providing unified and managed access to environmental monitoring and research data. The portal has the capability to host and publish data sets. Through the sharing of unique and high-value data sets worldwide, EnviDat fosters research and contributes to advancing environmental science.

de: EnviDat ist das Datenportal der WSL für einen einheitlichen und verwalteten Zugang zu Umweltdaten aus Monitoring- und Forschungsprojekten. Auf dem Portal können Datensätze gehostet und veröffentlicht werden. Durch die weltweite Bereitstellung einzigartiger und wertvoller Datensätze leistet EnviDat einen Beitrag zur Forschung im Bereich der Umweltwissenschaften.

it: EnviDat è il portale dati del WSL che fornisce un accesso unificato e gestito ai dati di monitoraggio ambientale e di ricerca. Il portale ha la capacità di ospitare e pubblicare serie di dati preziosi e unici che vengono condivisi in tutto il mondo. Così facendo, EnviDat promuove la ricerca e contribuisce al progresso della scienza ambientale.

political_level: other

wsl

capacity: public

type: organization

approval_status: approved

key: guid

key: uri

value: Envidat Harvester

en: Snow water equivalent for reference date April 1 for Wägital catchment, starting 1943


en: wetlands conservation amphibians landscape occupancy-models

en: Model code

media_type: Rmd

en: This R markdown file contains all code and descriptions necessary to load and format the provided data and to fit the dynamic occupancy models described in the associated publication, including JAGS code for the fitted models.

format: SERVICE

en: Observation data

media_type: CSV

en: This file contains detection/non-detection data for the 12 amphibian species between 1999 and 2019 for 3 annual visits. Detectable denotes whether or not a visit j was made to pond i in year t. ObservedID gives a unique ID for the observer collecting the data during visit j to pond i in year t.

format: CSV

en: Covariate data 2

en: This file contains covariate data that changes over time for 856 ponds in 21 years (long format): whether or not a pond exists in year _t_, the age of constructed ponds in year _t_, structural connectivity of the pond in year _t_.

en: Covariate data 1

en: This file contains covariate data that does not change over time for 856 ponds: the region the pond is in, whether the pond is old or new (constructed since 1991), elevation, water surface area, fluctuations of the water table (yes, no), the percent forest cover in 100m radius around the pond, the area or large (>6m wide) roads in 1km radius around the pond.

en: Readme

media_type: PDF

en: Description of methods and datasets.

format: PDF

en: Model code, description

en: This is the output of the R markdown file that provides JAGS model code and describes how to format the provided data and fit the dynamic occupancy models described in the associated publication, for a quick overview.

format: HTML

en: Original raw data

media_type: XLSX

en: This file contains the original raw monitoring data as provided by the canton of Aargau. Access is restricted and only considered upon request and in consultation with the canton of Aargau.

format: XLS

en:
In the canton of Aargau, hundreds of new ponds have been constructed since the 1990s to benefit declining amphibian populations. This dataset consists of monitoring data for all 12 pond-breeding amphibian species in the canton of Aargau from 1999 to 2019 in 856 ponds, and environmental variables that describe the ponds and the landscape surrounding the ponds. Species observation data is detection/non-detection data from repeat visits during survey years, during which all potentially suitable ponds in an area were surveyed. Environmental variables describing the ponds are whether the pond has been newly constructed since 1991 or not, pond age (if constructed), elevation a.s.l., the water surface area, and whether the water table fluctuates or not. Environmental variables describing the surroundings of the ponds are the percent area of forest within a circular buffer of radius 100m around the pond, the area of large (width ≥6m) roads within a circular buffer of radius 1km around the pond, and structural connectivity.

The canton of Aargau is the owner of the monitoring data; the original datafile is only disclosed upon request and in consultation with the canton of Aargau.

The edited dataset contains cleaned observation data for the 12 amphibian species, as well as compiled and edited covariate data and code to fit dynamic occupancy models.

amphibians

display_name: amphibians

conservation

display_name: conservation

landscape

display_name: landscape

occupancy-models

display_name: occupancy-models

wetlands

display_name: wetlands

en: Amphibian observation and pond data (Aargau, Switzerland)


maintainer: Yves Bühler

en: hazard-indication-mapping avalanche hazard-mapping snow ramms release

en: Potential Release  Area  NHESS

media_type: application/zip

en: This folder contains the output of the different investigated algorithms plus the reference dataset, used for training and validation.

format: ZIP

mimetype: application/zip

en: RAMMS simulations NHESS

en: Simulated maximum pressures for the scenarios frequent and extreme taking the forest layer into account

en:
This dataset contains the output and reference data published in the paper "Automated snow avalanche release area delineation - validation of existing algorithms and proposition of a new object-based approach for large scale hazard indication mapping" Yves Bühler, Daniel von Rickenbach, Andreas Stoffel, Stefan Margreth, Lukas Stoffel, Marc Christen (2018) Natural Hazards And Earth System Sciences.

Abstract:
Snow avalanche hazard is threatening people and infrastructure in all alpine regions with seasonal or permanent snow cover around the globe. Coping with this hazard is a big challenge and during the past centuries, different strategies were developed. Today, in Switzerland, experienced avalanche engineers produce hazard maps with a very high reliability based on avalanche cadastre information, terrain analysis, climatological datasets and numerical modelling of the flow dynamics for selected avalanche tracks that might affect settlements. However, for regions outside the considered settlement areas such area-wide hazard maps are not available mainly because of the too high cost, in Switzerland and in most mountain regions around the world. Therefore, hazard indication maps, even though they are less reliable and less detailed, are often the only spatial planning tool available. To produce meaningful and cost-effective avalanche hazard indication maps over large regions (regional to national scale), automated release area delineation has to be combined with volume estimations and state-of-the-art numerical avalanche simulations.

In this paper we validate existing potential release area (PRA) delineation algorithms, published in peer-reviewed journals, that are based on digital terrain models and their derivatives such as slope angle, aspect, roughness and curvature. For validation, we apply avalanche cadastre data from three different ski resorts in the vicinity of Davos, Switzerland, where experienced ski-patrol staff mapped most avalanches in detail since many years. After calculating the best fit input parameters for every tested algorithm, we compare their performance based on the reference datasets. Because all tested algorithms do not provide meaningful delineation between individual potential release areas (PRA), we propose a new algorithm based on object-based image analysis (OBIA). In combination with an automatic procedure to estimate the average release depth (d0), defining the avalanche release volume, this algorithm enables the numerical simulation of thousands of avalanches over large regions applying the well-established avalanche dynamics model RAMMS. We demonstrate this for the region of Davos for two hazard scenarios, frequent (10 – 30 years return period) and extreme (100 – 300 years return period). This approach opens the door for large scale avalanche hazard indication mapping in all regions where high quality and resolution digital terrain models and snow data are available.

avalanche

display_name: avalanche

hazard-indication-mapping

display_name: hazard-indication-mapping

hazard-mapping

display_name: hazard-mapping

ramms

display_name: ramms

release

display_name: release

education

en: Education and science

envidat

en: EnviDat: the Environmental Data Portal

en: EnviDat is the WSL data portal providing unified and managed access to environmental monitoring and research data. The portal has the capability to host and publish data sets. Through the sharing of unique and high-value data sets worldwide, EnviDat fosters research and contributes to advancing environmental science.

en: Automated Avalanche Release Area (PRA) Delineation Davos


maintainer: Anita C. Risch

en: nutrient-network climate soil nitrogen grassland herbivore fertilization ammonification mineralization nitrification global-change

en: Risch et al. 2020 - Raw data for publication "Global impacts of fertilization and herbivore removal on soil net nitrogen mineralization are modulated by local climate and soil properties"

en:
we assessed how the removal of mammalian herbivores (Fence) and fertilization with growth-limiting nutrients (N, P, K, plus nine essential macro- and micronutrients; NPK) individually, and in combination (NPK+Fence), affected potential and realized soil net Nmin across 22 natural and semi-natural grasslands on five continents. Our sites spanned a comprehensive range of climatic and edaphic conditions found across the grassland biome. We focused on grasslands, because they cover 40-50% of the ice-free land surface and provide vital ecosystem functions and services. They are particularly important for forage production and C sequestration. Worldwide, grasslands store approximately 20-30% of the Earth’s terrestrial C, most of it in the soil (Schimel, 1995; White et al., 2000).

Study sites and experimental design
The 22 sites contributing to this project are part of the Nutrient Network Global Research Cooperative (NutNet, https://nutnet.umn.edu/). Mean annual temperature across our 22 sites ranged from -4 to 22°C, mean annual precipitation from 252 to 1,592 mm, and elevations from 6 to 4,261 m above sea level (Fig. 1, Supplementary Table S1). Soil organic C varied from 0.8 to 7.8%, soil total N from 0.1 to 0.6%, and the soil C:N ratio from 9.1 to 21.5. Soil clay content spanned from 3.0 to 35%, and soil pH from 3.4 to 7.6 (Supplementary Table S2). Thus, the sites covered a wide range of environments in which grasslands occur (Fig. 1, Supplementary Table S1 & S2).
At each site, the effects of nutrient addition and herbivore removal were tested via a randomized-block design (Borer et al., 2014; Supplementary Fig. S1a). Three replicate blocks with 10 treatment plots each were established at each site, with the exception of the site at bldr.us, where only two blocks were established (Supplementary Fig. S1a). The 10 plots were randomly assigned to a nutrient or fencing treatment, but only a subset of four plots was used in the current study, each with a different treatment (see below; Supplementary Fig. S1a). All plots were 5 x 5 m and divided into four 2.5 x 2.5 m subplots (Supplementary Fig. S1b). Each subplot was further divided into four 1 x 1 m square sampling plots, one of which was set aside for soil sampling (Borer et al., 2014; Supplementary Fig. S1b). Plots were separated by at least 1 m wide walkways.
In this study, we collected data from the following four treatments: (i) untreated control plots (Control), (ii) herbivore removal plots (Fence), (iii) plots fertilized with N, P, K, plus nine essential macro and micronutrients (NPK), and (iv) plots with simultaneous fertilizer addition and herbivore removal (NPK+Fence; Supplementary Fig. S1a). The number of years of treatment differed among sites (2 – 9 years since start of treatment; Supplementary Table S1). For the nutrient additions, all sites applied 10 g N m-2 yr-1 as time-release urea; 10 g P m-2 yr-1 as triple-super phosphate; 10 g K m-2 yr-1 as potassium sulfate. A micro-nutrient mix (Fe, S, Mg, Mn, Cu, Zn, B, Mo, Ca) was applied at 100 g m-2 together with K in the first year of treatments but not thereafter.
The vertebrate herbivore removal treatment (Fence) was established by fencing two plots, one control and one NPK plot, within each of the blocks (Supplementary Fig. S1a). We designed the fences so that they would effectively exclude aboveground mammalian herbivores with a body mass of over 50 g (Borer et al., 2014). At the majority of sites, the height of the fences was 180 cm, and the fence design included wire mesh (1 cm holes) on the first 90 cm along with a 30 cm outward-facing flange stapled to the ground to exclude burrowing animals; climbing and subterranean animals may potentially still access these plots (Borer et al., 2014). For slight modifications in fence design at a few sites see Supplementary Table S3. While most sites only had native herbivores, a few sites (4) were also grazed by domestic animals (Supplementary Table S1).
Potential and realized soil net N mineralization, ammonification, nitrification and other soil properties
Each site participating in the study received a package containing identical material from the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) to be used for sampling and on-site N incubations. For the field incubation, we followed the protocol by Risch et al. (2015, 2019). Briefly, we drove a 5 x 15 cm (diameter x depth) steel cylinder 13.5 cm deep into the soil after clipping the vegetation at randomized locations in each plot. The top 1.5 cm of the cylinder remained empty to capture incoming N from run-off or deposition with a polyester mesh bag (mesh-size 250 µm) filled with 13.2 ± 0.9 g of acidic and alkaline exchanger resin (1:1 mixture; ion-exchanger I KA/ion-exchanger III AA, Merck AG, Darmstadt). The bag was fixed in place with a metal Seeger ring (Bruetsch-Rüegger Holding, Urdorf, Switzerland). We then removed 1.5 cm soil at the bottom of the cylinder and placed another resin bag to capture N leached from the soil column. The exchange resin was saturated with H+ and Cl- prior to filling the bags by stirring the mixture in 1.2M HCl for 1 h and then rinsing it with demineralized water until the electrical conductivity of the water reached 5 μS/cm. The cylinders were then re-inserted into the cored hole, level with the soil surface, and incubated for an average of 42 days (range 40 to 57days). The individual site coordinators chose the timing of incubation to start approximately six weeks prior to peak plant biomass production. All incubations were completed between February 2015 and January 2016 accounting for differences in growing season between northern and southern hemispheres. At the end of the incubation, the cylinders were re-collected and immediately shipped to WSL in an insulated box together with cold packs to halt further mineralization. Gloves were worn at all times to avoid contamination of the samples. Upon arrival at WSL, we extracted the resin bags and a 20 g subsample of sieved soil (4 mm) separately in a 100 ml PE-bottle with 80 ml 1 M KCl for 1.5 h on an end-over-end shaker and filtered through ashless folded filter paper (DF 5895 150, ALBET LabScience). We measured NO3- (colorimetrically; Norman & Stucki, 1981) and NH4+concentrations (flow injection analysis; FIAS 300, Perkin Elmer) on these filtrates.
At the start of the field incubation, we additionally collected two soil cores of 5 x 12 cm (diameter x depth) in each sampling plot and composited them to measure potential soil net Nmin, soil chemical and biological properties (see below). We also collected an additional sample (5 x 12 cm) to assess soil physical properties, which remained within the steel cylinder. Both ends were tightly closed with plastic caps. Cores were carefully packed to avoid further disturbance, and together with the composited soil samples, were shipped to the laboratory at WSL within a few days after collection.
From the composited samples, we extracted an equivalent of 20 g dry soil with KCl, as described above, and measured NO3- and NH4+concentrations. Realized soil net Nmin was then calculated as the difference between the inorganic N content of samples collected at the end of the incubation (plus N extracted from the bottom resin bag) and the N content at the beginning of the incubation; values were scaled to represent daily mineralization rates (mg N kg-1soil d-1; Risch et al., 2015). Realized soil net Nmin values represent an average period of 42 days prior to peak biomass, typically the highest period of biological activity, and not the entire year (Risch et al., 2019).
A second subsample of the composited sample was used to determine potential soil net Nmin in the laboratory (Risch et al., 2019). Briefly, we weighed duplicate samples (8 g dry soil) into 50-ml Falcon tubes. Soil moisture was brought to 60% of the field capacity of each plot, the Falcon tubes tightly closed and then incubated at 20°C for 42 days in a dark room. Every week the Falcon tubes were opened and ventilated. At the end of the incubation, the soil samples were extracted the same way as described above and NO3- and NH4+ was determined. Potential soil net Nmin was calculated as the difference between the N content before and after the incubation and scaled to represent daily values (mg N kg-1soil d-1). Using our NO3- and NH4+ measures we also calculated potential and realized soil net nitrification and soil net ammonification to be able to better understand the drivers of fertilization and herbivore removal effects on potential and realized soil net Nmin.
A third subsample of the composite soil sample was sieved (2 mm mesh) and microbial biomass (μg Cmic g-1 soil dry weight) was estimated by measuring the maximal respiratory response to the addition of glucose solution (4 mg glucose per g soil dry weight dissolved in distilled water; substrate-induced respiration method) on approximately 5.5 g of soil (Anderson & Domsch, 1978). The rest of the composited sample was dried at 65°C for 48 h, ground and sieved (2 mm mesh) to assess a series of soil chemical properties (Risch et al., 2019). We measured the percentage of clay as an indicator of soil texture (Gee & Bauder, 1986; Risch et al., 2019).
Statistical analyses
Potential and realized soil net Nmin were square root transformed to account for a highly skewed data distribution (yt = sign(y)*sqrt|y|; negative values in the data set impeded log transformation). To assess treatment effects on potential and realized soil net Nmin, we used linear mixed effects models (LMMs) fitted by maximum likelihood using the lme function from the nlme package (version 3.131.1; Pinheiro et al., 2016), R version 3.6.1; R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Treatment (Control, Fence, NPK, NPK+Fence) was a fixed factor, with site and block as random factors, where block was nested within site. We also tested for effects of time since start of treatments in preliminary analyses by adding total treatment years as an additional fixed factor. We did not find a significant effect of years of treatment, and thus dropped this variable from the models. The LMMs were corrected using varIdent if the homogeneity of variance criterion was not met (Pinheiro et al., 2016). To visualize our results, we calculated treatment effects using Cohens’ d statistic (Cohen, 1977; Koricheva et al., 2013). Note that calculating response ratios (or log response ratios) was not possible with our data, as we have both negative and positive values. We also fitted LMMs for potential and realized soil net ammonification and nitrification to gain more insight into how global change affects the processes underpinning potential and realized soil net Nmin. We also sqrt-transformed (see above) these dependent variables. Treatment was included as a fixed factor with random factors as described above. In addition, we assessed how potential and realized soil net Nmin were related to potential and realized soil net ammonification and nitrification, respectively. For this, we calculated site averages for each treatment separately. We then ran LMMs, with potential and realized soil net Nmin as the dependent variable, potential and realized soil net ammonification/nitrification as the independent ones. Site was included as a random factor.
Based on our previous work (Risch et al., 2019) and the existing literature (Schimel & Bennett, 2004; Liu et al., 2017), we developed a priori causal conceptual models of relationships among treatments, environmental drivers, and potential and realized soil net Nmin (Supplementary Fig. S2) to test with structural equation modelling (SEM) using a d-sep approach (Shipley, 2009; Lefcheck, 2016). The variables included in the model were long-term climatic conditions, specifically, site-level mean annual precipitation (MAP) and temperature of the wettest quarter (T.q.wet), plot-level soil texture (clay content) and soil microbial biomass. Mean annual precipitation and T.q.wet were obtained from WorldClim (Hijmans et al., 2005) (http://www.worldclim.org/) and together with the experimental treatments were predicted to directly affect soil properties and soil net Nmin (Supplementary Fig. S2). Soil clay content was, in turn, predicted to affect microbial biomass and soil net Nmin. Because we determined microbial biomass prior to incubating the samples in the laboratory or field, we assumed that the abundance of these microbes would be responsible for N process rates and not vice versa (Supplementary Fig. S2). We tested our conceptual model (Supplementary Fig. S2) using the piecewiseSEM package (version 2.0.2; Lefcheck, 2016) in R 3.4.0, in which a structured set of linear models are fitted individually. This approach allowed us to account for the nested experimental design, and overcome some of the limitations of standard structural equation models, such as small sample sizes (Shipley, 2009; Lefcheck, 2016). We used the lme function of the nlme package to model response variables, including site as a random factor. Good fit of the SEM was assumed when Fisher’s C values were non-significant (p > 0.05). For all significant interactions between covariates and experimental treatments detected in the SEMs, we calculated treatment effect sizes, i.e. the differences in potential or realized soil net Nmin between Control and treatments (Fence, NPK, NPK+Fence) and plotted these values against the climate or soil covariates. Finally, we fitted LMMs for the soil variables included in our SEMs, with treatment as the fixed factor, and with site and block as random factors, where block was nested within site.

en:
This dataset contains all data on which the following publication below is based.

Paper Citation:

Risch Anita C., Zimmermann, Stefan, Moser, Barbara, Schütz, Martin, Hagedorn, Frank, Firn, Jennifer, Fay, Philip A., Adler, Peter B., Biederman, Lori A., Blair, John M., Borer, Elizabeth T., Broadbent, Arthur A.D., Brown, Cynthia S., Cadotte, Marc W., Caldeira, Maria C., Davies, Kendi F., di Virgilio, Augustina, Eisenhauer, Nico, Eskelinen, Anu, Knops, Johannes M.H., MacDougall, Andrew S., McCulley, Rebecca L., Melbourne, Brett A., Moore, Joslin L., Power, Sally A., Prober, Suzanne M., Seabloom, Eric W., Siebert, Julia, Silveira, Maria L. , Speziale, Karina L., Stevens, Carly J., Tognetti, Pedro M., Virtanen, Risto, Yahdjian, Laura, Ochoa-Hueso, Raul (accepted). Global impacts of fertilization and herbivore removal on soil net nitrogen mineralization are modulated by local climate and soil properties. Global Change Biology

Please cite this paper together with the citation for the datafile.

We assessed how the removal of mammalian herbivores (Fence) and fertilization with growth-limiting nutrients (N, P, K, plus nine essential macro- and micronutrients; NPK) individually, and in combination (NPK+Fence), affected potential and realized soil net Nmin across 22 natural and semi-natural grasslands on five continents. Our sites spanned a comprehensive range of climatic and edaphic conditions found across the grassland biome. We focused on grasslands, because they cover 40-50% of the ice-free land surface and provide vital ecosystem functions and services. They are particularly important for forage production and C sequestration. Worldwide, grasslands store approximately 20-30% of the Earth’s terrestrial C, most of it in the soil (Schimel, 1995; White et al., 2000).

ammonification

display_name: ammonification

climate

display_name: climate

fertilization

display_name: fertilization

global-change

display_name: global-change

grassland

display_name: grassland

herbivore

display_name: herbivore

mineralization

display_name: mineralization

nitrification

display_name: nitrification

nitrogen

display_name: nitrogen

nutrient-network

display_name: nutrient-network

soil

display_name: soil

en: Anthropogenic change and soil net N mineralization


maintainer: Henning Löwe

en: discrete-element-modelling 3d-ct-images microstructure spherical-model-snow unconfined-compression-experiments snow-mechanics

en: Data Access

media_type: HTTPS

en: Data Structure (Python Notebook - view online)

media_type: ipynb

en: Data Structure (Python Notebook)

en:
For the investigation of microstructural and mechanical properties of snow unconfined compression experiments and 3D computed tomography (CT) imaging were performed on sintered rounded grain snow and spherical model snow. The spherical model snow was generated to create geometrically simplified, well-defined microstructures for calibration of numerical models, such as discrete element models (DEM) in which the microstructure is represented by spherical particles.
In the experiments, microstructural variation was created by varying the sintering time (contact size) and the density of the ice sphere samples (number of contacts). The 3D CT images allow for a complete reconstruction of the entire experimental sample (cylindrical sample dimension: diameter = 33.6 mm; height = 14 mm).

discrete-element-modelling

display_name: discrete-element-modelling

microstructure

display_name: microstructure

snow-mechanics

display_name: snow-mechanics

spherical-model-snow

display_name: spherical-model-snow

unconfined-compression-experiments

display_name: unconfined-compression-experiments

en: Unconfined compression experiments and 3D CT images of spherical model snow and RG snow samples


en: time-series groundwater studibach switzerland alptal

en:
Groundwater time series of the monitoring network in the Studibach (C7) catchment, Alptal, Switzerland published in
Rinderer M., van Meerveld I, McGlynn B. (2019): From points to patterns – Assessing runoff source area dynamics and hydrological connectivity using time series clustering. Water Resources Research, doi: 2018WR023886R

en: Groundwater time series between 2010 and 2014 of the distributed monitoring system in the Studibach (C7), Alptal, Switzerland. Data published in Rinderer M., van Meerveld I, McGlynn B. (2019): From points to patterns – Assessing runoff source area dynamics and hydrological connectivity using time series clustering. Water Resources Research, doi: 2018WR023886R

alptal

display_name: alptal

groundwater

display_name: groundwater

studibach

display_name: studibach

switzerland

display_name: switzerland

time-series

display_name: time-series

en: Groundwater time series Studibach (Rinderer et al., 2019, WRR)


maintainer: Marcia Phillips

en: temperature gemsstock borehole permafrost permos

en: DATASET & PLOTS

media_type: URL

en: Data visualiser and download service provided by PERMOS.

en: PERMOS DATA POLICY

en: Map of PERMOS borehole network

en:
Processed ground temperature measurements at the Gemsstock permafrost borehole in canton Uri, Switzerland. The borehole is located at 2940 m asl on a steep (50°) North-West slope (315°). The surface material is bedrock and borehole depth is 40 m. Thermistors used YSI 44008. Year of drilling 2006. This borehole is part of the Swiss Permafrost network, PERMOS (www.permos.ch). Contact phillips@slf.ch for details of processing applied.

Publications

1. A. Haberkorn, M. Phillips, R. Kenner, H. Rhyner, M. Bavay, S.P. Galos, M. Hoelzle. Thermal regime of rock and its relation to snow cover in steep Alpine rock walls: Gemsstock, central Swiss Alps. 2015. Geografiska Annaler: Series A, Physical Geography. Volume 97. Issue 3. 579–597. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/geoa.12101. 10.1111/geoa.12101.

2. R. Kenner, M. Phillips, C. Danioth, C. Denier, P. Thee, A. Zgraggen. Investigation of rock and ice loss in a recently deglaciated mountain rock wall using terrestrial laser scanning: Gemsstock, Swiss Alps. 2011. Cold Regions Science and Technology. Volume 67. Issue 3. 157–164. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2011.04.006. 10.1016/j.coldregions.2011.04.006.

borehole

display_name: borehole

gemsstock

display_name: gemsstock

permafrost

display_name: permafrost

permos

display_name: permos

temperature

display_name: temperature

education

en: Education and science

envidat

en: EnviDat: the Environmental Data Portal

en: EnviDat is the WSL data portal providing unified and managed access to environmental monitoring and research data. The portal has the capability to host and publish data sets. Through the sharing of unique and high-value data sets worldwide, EnviDat fosters research and contributes to advancing environmental science.

en: Processed permafrost borehole data (2940 m asl), Gemsstock, Switzerland


maintainer: James W. Kirchner

en: stable-water-isotopes catchment plynlimon precipitation deuterium chloride streamflow tracer

en: Weekly stable water isotopes

en: Data set of weekly stable water isotope data collected at Carreg Wen (precipitation) and Lower Hafren and Tanllwyth (streamflow).

en: Data Set Documentation

media_type: application/pdf

en: This file contains a documentation of the data sets, including references to other helpful documentations.

mimetype: application/pdf

en: 7-hourly stable water istopes

en: Data set of 7-hourly stable water isotope data measured at Carreg Wen (precipitation) and Upper Hafren (streamflow).

en: The data base contains timeseries of stable water isotopes in precipitation and streamflow at Plynlimon, Wales, UK. One data set contains weekly stable water isotope data from the Lower Hafren and Tanllwyth catchments, and the other data set contains 7-hourly stable water isotope data from Upper Hafren. Both data sets also include chloride concentrations in precipitation and streamflow.

catchment

display_name: catchment

chloride

display_name: chloride

deuterium

display_name: deuterium

plynlimon

display_name: plynlimon

precipitation

display_name: precipitation

stable-water-isotopes

display_name: stable-water-isotopes

streamflow

display_name: streamflow

tracer

display_name: tracer

en: Stable water isotopes in precipitation and streamflow at Plynlimon, Wales, UK


maintainer: Tessa Hegetschweiler

en: forest childhood recreational-activities teenagers adolescents

en: Dataset comments

en: The codebook to the dataset

en: Survey at schools 2017

en: The dataset of the questionnaire survey at schools in SPSS-format.

en: Dataset survey at schools

en: The dataset of the questionnaire survey at schools in excel format.

en: Questionnaire school survey

en: The questionnaire used in the survey at 8 schools aimed at teenagers in German.

en: The data results from a questionnaire survey conducted at 8 schools in the cantons Zurich, Aargau and St. Gallen. Respondents aged 13-22 years. The aim of the survey was to gain insight into teenagers' relationship to the forest, reasons for visiting or not visiting the forest and activities in the forest.

adolescents

display_name: adolescents

childhood

display_name: childhood

forest

display_name: forest

recreational-activities

display_name: recreational-activities

teenagers

display_name: teenagers

en: Factors influencing teenagers' forest visit frequency


restoring-grassland-multifunctionality

title_for_slug: restoring-grassland-multifunctionality

en: biodiversity soil-biodiversity restoration nematodes bacteria mineralization grassland ecosystem-multifunctionality plants fungi

en: Please note that EMF, MF.below, MF.abio and Soil.hetero have been corrected.

en: Functional diversity above_belowground fauna

en: Please note that C.sto and Corg have been corrected.

en:
Please cite this paper together with the citation for the datafile.

Resch, M. C., Schütz, M., Buchmann, N., Frey, B., Graf, U., van der Putten, W. H., Zimmermann, S., Risch, A. C. 2021. Evaluating long-term success in grassland restoration – an ecosystem multifunctionality approach. Ecological Applications 31, e02271.

 Study area

The study was conducted in the Canton of Zurich, Switzerland, in and around two nature reserves Eigental and Altläufe der Glatt (47°27’ to 47°29’ N, 8°37’ to 8°32’ E, 417 to 572 m a.s.l.). All studied grasslands were located with a radius of approximately 4 km. Average monthly temperatures range from 0.7 ± 2.0 °C (January) to 19.0 ± 1.5 °C (July), and monthly precipitation range from 60 ± 42 mm (January) to 118 ± 46 mm (July [maxima]; 1989-2017; MeteoSchweiz 2018). In our study, we focused on semi-dry and semi-wet oligo- to mesotrophic grasslands characterized by high plant species richness and groundwater fluctuations throughout the year (Delarze et al. 2015, see also Resch et al. 2019).

 Experimental design and sampling

A large-scale restoration experiment to expand and reconnect isolated remnants of species-rich grasslands was initiated in the nature reserve Eigental in 1990. Twenty hectares of adjacent intensive grasslands were chosen for restoration. In 1995, three restoration methods of increasing intervention intensities were implemented. The goal of all three methods was to lower the availability of soil nutrients and hence, facilitate ecosystem development towards the targeted nutrient-poor grasslands. These methods were: Harvest only (hay harvest twice a year), Topsoil (removal of the nutrient-rich topsoil), and Topsoil+Propagules (topsoil removal combined with the application of hay from target vegetation). Plant biomass harvest (once a year in late summer/early autumn) commenced in Topsoil and Topsoil+Propagules five years after the soils were removed and is still ongoing today. We measured restoration success by comparing the three restoration methods with intensively managed (Initial) and semi-natural grasslands (Target) 22 years after restoration. Initial grassland sites share the same agricultural history as the restored sites: mowing and subsequent fertilizing (manure) up to five times a year, as well as different tillage regimes (Resch et al. 2019). Target sites were the sites from which hay for seeding the Topsoil+Propagules sites was collected. Soil conditions (i.e., soil types, soil texture) were comparable to those found in the restored grasslands (Resch et al. 2019). Additionally, Target sites were selected to represent a variety of semi-natural grasslands, including semi-dry to semi-wet conditions. In Target grasslands, biomass is harvested once a year in late summer or early autumn. Eleven 5 m x 5 m (25 m2) plots were randomly established in each of the five treatments (in total 55 plots; for a detailed map see Neff et al. 2020). An additional 2 m x 2 m (4 m2) subplot was randomly established at least 2 m away from each 25 m2 plot for destructive sampling. Data sampling took place between June and September 2017.

Vegetation properties

All plant species were identified within the 25 m2 plots (nomenclature: Lauber and Wagner 1996) in mid-June 2017 (in total 250 species). Vegetation structure and plant biomass were assessed diagonally on a transect of 2 m x 10 cm within the 25 m2 plot in early July 2017. We measured the maximum and mean height of the vegetation at the start, middle and end of the transect and calculated the standard deviation of these measures to describe vegetation structural heterogeneity (Schuldt et al. 2019). Thereafter, biomass was clipped on the entire transect to 1 cm height, sorted into five functional groups (graminoids, forbs, legumes, litter, and woody species), dried at 60 °C for 48 h, and weighed (Meyer et al. 2015).

 Aboveground arthropods

Aboveground arthropods were sampled at two locations in each 25 m2 plot in early July 2017 (see also Neff et al. 2020). Briefly, two cylindrical baskets (50 cm diameter, 67 cm height; woven fabric) were thrown simultaneously from outside the plot into two opposite corners. A closable mosquito mesh sleeve was mounted to the top of the baskets and an integrated metal ring at the bottom was fixed to the ground with metal stakes to assure that insects could not escape. A suction sampler (Vortis, Burkhard Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Hertfordshire, England) was then inserted into one of the baskets through the opening of the sleeve and the plot was “vacuumed" twice for 105 seconds with a 30 seconds break. The collected animals were immediately transferred into 70% ethanol. Arthropods were sorted and assigned to 23 taxonomic groups. Holometabolic larvae were lumped into one category while hemimetabolic larvae were grouped separately from adults in the respective taxonomic rank. We used mean values of individuals per plot for total abundance. Aboveground arthropod richness was defined by the number of different taxa to lowest taxonomic level (in total 23 taxa). All taxa were assigned to one of five trophic levels: 1) primary producers, 2) primary consumers, 3) secondary consumers, 4) tertiary consumers, and 5) quaternary consumers.

 Belowground fauna

Sampling of all belowground fauna took place in mid-July 2017. Earthworms were sampled in two 30 cm x 30 cm x 20 cm soil monoliths at two opposite corners of the 25 m2 plot (opposite to aboveground arthropod sampling). The excavated soil monolith was broken by hand, all earthworms collected and immediately transferred in a 4% formaldehyde solution. Thereafter, earthworm individuals were identified to species level (in total 10 taxa; Christian and Zicsi 1999) and species assigned to three functional groups (Bouché 1977).
To assess soil arthropod communities, we randomly collected one undisturbed soil core (5 cm diameter, 12 cm depth) in each 4 m2 subplot with a slide hammer corer lined with a plastic sleeve (AMS Samplers, American Falls, Idaho, USA). Soil arthropods were extracted using Berlese-Tullgren funnels (3 mm mesh), starting the day of sampling and lasting 14 days. Individuals were stored in 70% ethanol. Soil arthropods were assigned to 41 taxonomic groups and 4 feeding types. Holometabolic and hemimetabolic larvae were treated as previously described for aboveground arthropods. Belowground arthropod richness refers to the 41 taxonomic groups.

For soil nematode sampling, we randomly collected eight soil cores of 2.2 cm diameter (Giddings Machine Company, Windsor, CO, USA) within each 4 m2 subplot to a depth of 12 cm. The eight cores were combined, gently homogenized, placed in coolers, kept at 4 °C and transported to the laboratory at NIOO in Wageningen (NL) within one week after collection. Free-living nematodes were extracted from 200 g of fresh soil using Oostenbrink elutriator (Oostenbrink 1960) and prepared for morphological identification and quantification as described by Resch et al. (2019). Nematodes were identified to family level (39 taxa) according to Bongers (1988), assigned to 17 functional groups, 5 feeding types and 5 colonizer-persister (C-P) classes (Yeates et al. 1993, Bongers 1990, Resch et al. 2019).

We randomly collected two more soil cores (2.2 cm diameter x 12 cm depth) within each 4 m2 subplot to determine soil microbial communities. Again, the soil cores were combined, homogenized, placed in coolers and transported to the laboratory at WSL in Birmensdorf (Switzerland) where the metagenomic DNA was extracted from 8 g sieved soil (2 mm) using the DNeasy PowerMax Soil Kit (Quiagen, Hilden, NRW, GER) according to the manufacturer`s instructions. PCR amplification of the V3-V4 region of the prokaryotic small-subunit (16S) and the ribosomal internal transcribed spacer region (ITS2) of eukaryotes was performed with 1 ng of template DNA utilizing PCR primers and conditions as previously described (Frey et al., 2016). PCRs were run in triplicates and pooled. The pooled amplicons were sent to the Genome Quebec Innovation Centre (Montreal, QC, Canada) for barcoding using the Fluidigm Access Array technology (Fluidigm) and paired-end sequencing on the Illumina MiSeq v3 platform (Illumina Inc., San Diego, CA, USA). Quality filtering, clustering into operational taxonomic units (OTUs) and taxonomic assignment were performed as described by Frey et al. (2016) and Adamczyk et al. (2019). We used a customised pipeline largely based on UPARSE (Edgar 2013) implemented in USEARCH v. 9.2 (Edgar 2010). After discarding singletons of dereplicated sequences, clustering into OTUs with 97% sequence similarity was performed (Edgar 2013). Quality-filtered reads were mapped on the filtered set of centroid sequences. Taxonomic classification of prokaryotic and fungal sequences was conducted querying against most recent versions of SILVA (v.132, Quast et al. 2013) and UNITE (v.8, Nilsson et al. 2018). Only taxonomic assignments with confidence rankings equal or higher than 0.8 were accepted (assignments below 0.8 set to unclassified). Prokaryotic OTUs assigned to mitochondria or chloroplasts as well as eukaryotic OTUs assigned other than fungi were removed prior to data analysis. In addition, prokaryotic and fungal datasets were filtered to discard singletons and doubletons. Thereafter, OTU abundance matrices were rarefied to the lowest number of sequences per community, to normalize the total number of reads and achieve parity between samples (Prokaryota: 29,843 reads; Fungi: 26,690 reads). Finally, prokaryotic and fungal observed richness (number of OTUs) were estimated (Prokaryota: 14,010 OTUs; Fungi: 5,813 OTUs). For prokaryotes, we distinguished five and for fungi six functional types based on lowest taxonomic resolution (Nguyen et al. 2016, Tedersoo et al. 2014). Belowground taxon richness was defined by the total number of earthworm, arthropod, nematode, fungi, and prokaryote taxa assigned to lowest taxonomic level. Finally, all belowground taxa were assigned to the same five trophic levels as the aboveground arthropods.

 Soil chemical and physical properties, soil nitrogen mineralization

We randomly collected three 5 cm diameter x 12 cm depth soil samples in each 4 m2 subplot with a slide hammer corer (AMS Samplers, American Falls, Idaho, USA), pooled them and then made two subsamples. One was field-fresh and stored at 3 °C until analysis, the other was dried for 48 h at 60 °C and passed through a 4 mm mesh. From the dried sample, we measured soil pH potentiometrically in 0.01 M CaCl2 (soil:solution ratio=1:2; 30 minutes equilibration time). Total and organic carbon content were measured on fine-ground samples (≤ 0.5 mm) by dry combustion using a CN analyzer NC 2500 (CE Instruments, Wigan, United Kingdom). Inorganic carbon of samples with a pH > 6.5 was removed with acid vapor prior to analysis of organic carbon (Walthert et al. 2010). We calculated total soil carbon (C) storage after correcting its content for soil depth, stone content and density of fine earth (see below). Exchangeable cations were determined on another 5 g dry soil sample with 50 mL unbuffered 1 M NH4Cl solution (soil:solution ratio=1:10, end-over-end shaker for 1.5 hours) and measured by an ICP-OES (Optima 7300 DV, Perkin-Elmer, Waltham, Massachusetts, USA). Thereafter, cation exchange capacity (CEC) was calculated as the sum of exchangeable cations and protons (and expressed as mmolc per 1 kg soil) and used to describe nutrient retention capacity in our plots. Concentrations of exchangeable protons were calculated as the difference between total and Al-induced exchangeable acidity as determined by the KCl-method (Thomas 1982).

Ammonium (NH4+) and nitrate (NO3−) were extracted from a 20 g fresh subsample with 80 mL 1M KCl for 1.5 hours on an end-over-end shaker and filtered through ashless folded filter paper (DF 5895 150, ALBET LabScience, Hahnemühle FineArt GmbH, Dassel, Germany). NH4+ concentrations were determined colorimetrically by automated flow injection analysis (FIAS 300, Perkin-Elmer, Waltham, Massachusetts, USA). NO3− concentrations were measured colorimetrically according to Norman and Stucki (1981). Potential soil net nitrogen (N) mineralization was assessed during an 8-week incubation period under controlled moisture (60% of field capacity), temperature (20 °C) and light conditions (dark) in the laboratory. We weighed duplicate samples of fresh soil equivalent to 8 g dry soil (24 h at 104 °C) into 50 mL Falcon tubes. Soil samples were extracted for NH4+ and NO3− at the beginning and after eight weeks as described above. Soil net N mineralization was calculated as the difference between the inorganic nitrogen (NH4+ and NO3−) before and after the incubation (Hart et al. 1994), corrected for the total incubation time and represented per day values expressed as mg N kg-1 soil d-1.

To assess soil physical properties, we randomly collected one undisturbed soil core per 4 m2 subplot (5 cm diameter, 12 cm depth) in a steel cylinder that fit into the slide hammer (AMS Samplers, American Falls, Idaho, USA). The cylinder was capped in the field to avoid disturbance. We then measured field capacity in the laboratory. For this purpose, the cylinder and soil therein were saturated in a water bath and drained on a sand/silt-bed with a suction corresponding to 60 cm hydrostatic head. The moist soil was dried at 105 °C to constant weight. Field capacity was calculated by dividing the mass of water by the total mass of wet soil contained at 60 cm hydrostatic head and used to describe water holding capacity. Thereafter, samples were passed through a 4 mm mesh. Fine-earth and skeleton fractions were weighed separately to assess bulk soil density (fine-earth plus skeleton), density of fine earth, and proportion of skeleton. Particle density was determined with the pycnometer method (Blake and Hartge 1986), and total porosity and proportion of fine pores were calculated (Danielson and Sutherland 1986). Clay, silt, and sand contents were quantified with the sediment method (Gee and Bauder 1986).

Surface and soil temperature (12 cm depth, water-resistant digital pocket thermometer; IP65, H-B Instrument, Trappe, Pennsylvania, USA) as well as volumetric soil moisture content (12 cm depth, time domain reflectometry; Field-Scout TDR 300, Spectrum Technologies, Aurora, Illinois, USA) were measured at five random locations within the 4 m2 subplots every month from June to September. We calculated the standard deviation of each temperature and moisture measure over four months to describe seasonal variations. Slope inclination was determined at plot-level via GPS measurements (GPS 1200, Leica Geosystem, Heerbrugg, Switzerland) and categorized into slope gradient classes according to FAO standards (1990). Thickness of the topsoil horizon (equivalent to Ah or Aa horizon) was determined at one soil monolith (30 x 30 x 30 cm3) per 4 m2 subplot in cm and rounded to next integer.

 References

Adamczyk, M., F. Hagedorn, S. Wipf, J. Donhauser, P. Vittoz, C. Rixen, A. Frossard, J. Theurillat, and B. Frey. 2019. The soil microbiome of GLORIA mountain summits in the Swiss Alps. Frontiers in Microbiology 10:1080-1101.

Blake, G.R., and K. H. Hartge. 1986. Particle Density. Pages 377-382 in A. Klute, editor. Methods of soil analysis: Part 1—Physical and mineralogical methods. Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) Inc., Madison.

Bongers, T. 1988. De nematoden van Nederland. Stichting Uitgeverij van de Koniklijke Nederlandse Natuurhistorische Verenigung (KNNV), Utrecht.

Bongers, T. 1990. The maturity index: an ecological measure of environmental disturbance based on nematode species composition. Oecologia 83:14-19.

Bouché, M. B. 1977. Strategies lombriciennes. Ecological Bulletins 25:122-132.

Christian, E., and A. Zicsi. 1999. Ein synoptischer Bestimmungsschlüssel der Regenwürmer Österreichs (Oligochaeta: Lumbricidae). Die Bodenkultur 50:121-131.

Danielson, R. E., and P. L. Sutherland. 1986. Porosity. Pages 443-461 in A. Klute, editor. Methods of soil analysis: Part 1—Physical and mineralogical methods. Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) Inc., Madison.

Delarze, R., Y. Gonseth, S. Eggenberg, and M. Vust. 2015. Lebensräume der Schweiz: Ökologie ‐ Gefährdung ‐ Kennarten, Ott Verlag, Bern.

Edgar, R. C. 2010. Search and clustering orders of magnitude faster than BLAST. Bioinformatics 26:2460–2461.

Edgar, R. C. 2013. UPARSE: highly accurate OTU sequences from microbial amplicon reads. Nature Methods 10:996–998.

FAO. 1990. Guidelines for soil description, third ed. Land and Water Development Division at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Rome.

Frey, B., T. Rime, M. Phillips, B. Stierli, I. Hajdas, F. Widmer, and M. Hartmann. 2016. Microbial diversity in European alpine permafrost and active layers. FEMS Microbiology Ecology 92:fiw018.

Gee, G.W., and J. W. Bauder. 1986. Particle-size analysis. Pages 383-411 in A. Klute, editor. Methods of soil analysis: Part 1—Physical and mineralogical methods. Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) Inc., Madison.

Hart, S. C, J. M. Stark, E. A. Davidson, and M. K. Firestone. 1994. Nitrogen mineralization, immobilization, and nitrification. Pages 985-1016 in R. W. Weaver, S. Angle, P. Bottomley, D. Bezdicek, S. Smith, A. Tabatabai, and A. Wollum, editors. Methods of soil analysis: Part 2—Microbiological and biochemical properties. Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) Inc., Madison.

Lauber, K., Wagner, G., 1996. Flora Helvetica. Flora der Schweiz. Haupt Verlag, Bern.

MeteoSchweiz, 2018. Klimabulletin Jahr 2017. MeteoSchweiz, Zürich.

Meyer, S. T., C. Koch, and W. W. Weisser. 2015. Towards a standardized rapid ecosystem function assessment (REFA). Trends in Ecology and Evolution 30:390-397.

Neff, F., M. C. Resch, A. Marty, J. Rolley, M. Schütz, A. C. Risch, and M. M. Gossner. 2020. Long-term restoration success of insect herbivore communities in semi-natural grasslands – a functional approach. Ecological Applications 0:e02133

Nguyen, N.H., Z. W. Song, S. T. Bates, S. Branco, L. Tedersoo, J. Menke, J. S. Schilling, and P. G. Kennedy. 2016. FUNGuild: an open annotation tool for parsing fungal community datasets by ecological guild. Fungal Ecology 20:241–248.

Nilsson, R. H., K.-H. Larsson, A. F. S. Taylor, J. Bengtsson-Palme, T. S. Jeppesen, D. Schigel, P. G. Kennedy, K. Picard, F. O. Glöckner, L. Tedersoo, I. Saar, U. Kõljalg, and K. Abarenkov. 2018. The UNITE database for molecular identification of fungi: handling dark taxa and parallel taxonomic classifications. Nucleic Acids Research 47:259–264.

Norman, R. J., and J. W. Stucki. 1981. The Determination of Nitrate and Nitrite in Soil Extracts by Ultraviolet Spectrophotometry. Soil Science Society of America Journal 45:347-353.

Oostenbrink, M. 1960. Estimating nematode populations by some selected methods. Pages 81-101 in J. J. Sasser, and W. R. Jenkins, editors. Nematology. Univ. of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill.

Quast, C., E. Pruesse, P. Yilmaz, J. Gerken, T. Schweer, P. Yarza, J. Peplies, and F. O. Glöckner. 2013. The SILVA ribosomal RNA gene database project: improved data processing and web-based tools. Nucleic Acids Research 41:590-596.

Resch, M. C., M. Schütz, U. Graf, R. Wagenaar, W.H. van der Putten, and A. C. Risch. 2019. Does topsoil removal in grassland restoration benefit both soil nematode and plant communities? Journal of Applied Ecology 56:1782-1793.

Schuldt, A., A. Ebeling, M. Kunz, M. Staab, C. Guimarães-Steinicke, D. Bachmann, N. Buchmann, W. Durka, A. Fichtner, F. Fornoff, W. Härdtle, L. R. Hertzog, A-N. Klein, C. Roscher, J. Schaller, von G. Oheimb, A. Weigelt, W. Weisser, C.Wirth, J. Zhang, H. Bruelheide, and N. Eisenhauer. 2019. Multiple plant diversity components drive consumer communities across ecosystems. Nature Communications 10:1460.

Tedersoo, L., M. Bahram, S. Põlme, U. Kõljalg, N. S. Yorou, R. Wijesundera, L. Villarreal Ruiz, A. M. Vasco-Palacios, P. Q. Thu, A. Suija, M. E. Smith, C. Sharp, E. Saluveer, A. Saitta, M. Rosas, T. Riit, D. Ratkowsky, K. Pritsch, K. Põldmaa, M. Piepenbring, C. Phosri, M. Peterson, K. Parts, K. Pärtel, E. Otsing, E. Nouhra, A. L. Njouonkou, R. H. Nilsson, L. N. Morgado, J. Mayor, T. W. May, L. Majuakim, D. J. Lodge, S. See Lee, K.-H. Larsson, P. Kohout, K. Hosaka, I. Hiiesalu, T. W. Henkel, H. Harend, L.-D. Guo, A. Greslebin, G. Grelet, J. Geml, G. Gates, W. Dunstan, C. Dunk, R. Frenkhan, L. Dearnaley, A. De Kesel, T. Dang, X. Chen, F. Buegger, F. Q. Brearley, G. Bonito, S. Anslan, S. Abell, and K. Abarenkov. 2014. Global diversity and geography of soil fungi. Science 346:1256688.

Thomas, G.W. 1982. Exchangeable cations. Pages 159-165 in A. L. Page, R. H. Miller, and D. R. Keeney, editors. Methods of Soil Analysis: Part 2—Chemical and microbiological properties. Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) Inc., Madison.

Walthert, L., U. Graf, A. Kammer, J. Luster, D. Pezzotta, S. Zimmermann, and F. Hagedorn. 2010. Determination of organic and inorganic carbon, δ13C, and nitrogen in soils containing carbonates after acid fumigation with HCl. Journal of Plant Nutrition and Soil Sciences 173:207-216.

Yeates, G. W., T. Bongers, R. G. M. de Goede, D. W. Freckman, and S. S. Georgieva. 1993. Feeding habits in soil nematode families and genera – an outline for soil ecologists. Journal of Nematology 25:315-331.

bacteria

display_name: bacteria

biodiversity

display_name: biodiversity

ecosystem-multifunctionality

display_name: ecosystem-multifunctionality

fungi

display_name: fungi

grassland

display_name: grassland

mineralization

display_name: mineralization

nematodes

display_name: nematodes

plants

display_name: plants

restoration

display_name: restoration

soil-biodiversity

display_name: soil-biodiversity

education

en: Education and science

envidat

en: EnviDat: the Environmental Data Portal

en: EnviDat is the WSL data portal providing unified and managed access to environmental monitoring and research data. The portal has the capability to host and publish data sets. Through the sharing of unique and high-value data sets worldwide, EnviDat fosters research and contributes to advancing environmental science.

en: Restoring grassland multifunctionality


en: electrodermal-activity sense-of-place place-attachment urban-ecology landscape

en: 03. Publication Ready Data

media_type: ZIP

en: 01. EDA Processed Data

en: 04. Scripts

en: 05. Visuals

en: 02. Questionnaire Data

en: 00. EDA Raw Data

en: This repository contains data on EDA measurements of visitors with different cultural backgrounds in virtual urban park settings. The parks are a Persian garden (Shiraz, Iran) and a historical park in Zurich, Switzerland. The cultural background of the visitors is Persian and Central European. The repository contains raw data from EDA, processed time series and statistical procedures.

electrodermal-activity

display_name: electrodermal-activity

landscape

display_name: landscape

place-attachment

display_name: place-attachment

sense-of-place

display_name: sense-of-place

urban-ecology

display_name: urban-ecology

en: Electrodermal Activity (EDA) of Bi-cultural Visitors In Virtual Park Settings


digitizing-historical-plague

maintainer: Christian Ginzler

title_for_slug: digitizing-historical-plague

en: plague-inventory yersinia-pestis palaeo-epidemiology historical-plague bubonic-plague black-death plague-mapping plague-outbreaks

en: We present newly digitized data on 6,929 plague outbreaks that occurred between 1347 and 1900 AD across Europe. The data base on an inventory initially published 1976. For georeferencing the information of Tele Atlas 2009 was used. The coordinates are in the reference systems ETRS89 and WGS84.

black-death

display_name: black-death

bubonic-plague

display_name: bubonic-plague

historical-plague

display_name: historical-plague

palaeo-epidemiology

display_name: palaeo-epidemiology

plague-inventory

display_name: plague-inventory

plague-mapping

display_name: plague-mapping

plague-outbreaks

display_name: plague-outbreaks

yersinia-pestis

display_name: yersinia-pestis

en: Digitizing historical plague


maintainer: Anita Risch

en: exclusion swiss-national-park ecosystem-coupling grazing vertebrates invertebrates subalpine ecosystem-functions ecosystem-multifunctionality grassland

en: Datafile

en:
ID: Plot ID composited of Fence & Treatment number (90 plots total)

Grassland: Name of the six subalpine grasslands where the exclosure setups were erected. In large grasslands (GRIM, MING, STAB), we established four hierarchical exclosure setups (two in short- and two in tall-grass vegetation), whereas in the small grasslands (BOTS, DADA, MARG) only one setup was erected per vegetation type. BOTS = Val dal Botsch, GRIM = Grimmels, MING = Val Mingér, STAB = Alp Stabelchod, DADA = Stabelchod da daint, MARG = Margunet

Fence: Number of exclosure setup (1 - 18). Note that uneven numbers (1,3,5,7,9,11,13,15,17) represent setups established on short-grass vegetation, even numbers (2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18) setups established in tall-grass vegetation
Vegetation	Vegetation type, 1 = short-grass vegetation, 2 = tall-grass vegetation; (9 replicate fences on each vegetation type)
Treatment	Progressive animal exclusion, numbers indicate which animals had access to the plot: 1 = Large/medium/small mammals, and invertebrates have access ("L/M/S/I"), 2 = Medium/small mammals, and invertebrates have access (“M/S/I”), 3 = Small mammals and invertebrates have access (“S/I”), 4 = Invertebrates have access (“I”), 5 = No animals have access (“None”)

Bulkden:	Fine fraction soil bulk density (g cm-3)

Soil.moist	: Soil moisture (%)

Soil.org.C: Rhizosphere soil C content (%)

pH: Soil pH

Nema.PC1: First principal component (PC1) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the soil nematode community composition

Nema.PC2: Second principal component (PC2) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the soil nematode community composition

Micro.PC1: 	First principal component (PC1) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the soil microbial community composition

Micro.PC2: Second principal component (PC2) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the soil microbial community composition

Abv.Inv.PC1: First principal component (PC1) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the aboveground-dwelling invertebrate community composition

Abv.Inv.PC2: Second principal component (PC2) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the aboveground-dwelling invertebrate community composition

Arthr.PC1: First principal component (PC1) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the soil arthropod community composition

Arthr.PC2: Second principal component (PC2) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the soil arthropod community composition

Plant.PC1: First principal component (PC1) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the plant community composition

Plant.PC2: Second principal component (PC2) of principal component analysis (PCA) of the plant community composition

Root.biomass: Root biomass (g m-2)

Micro.biomass	: Microbial biomass carbon (mg kg-1)

Plant.richness: Plant species richness

Plant.N: Plant tissue nitrogen content (%)

Soil.N.min: Soil net nitrogen mineralisation (kg ha-1 season)

Soil.resp: Soil carbon dioxide emissions (soil respiration; g m-2 h-1)

en:
This dataset contains all data on which the following publication below is based.

Paper Citation:
 > Risch AC, Ochoa-Hueso R, van der Putten WH, Bump JK, Busse MD, Frey B, Gwiazdowicz DJ, Page-Dumroese DS, Vandegehuchte ML, Zimmermann S, Schütz M. Size-dependent loss of aboveground animals differentially affects grassland ecosystem coupling and functions. 2018. Nature Communications 9: 3684. [doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-06105-4](https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-06105-4).

Please cite this paper together with the citation for the datafile.

#Methods
Study sites
The experimental exclosure setups were installed within the SNP (IUCN category Ia preserve; Dudley 2008), in south-eastern Switzerland. The park covers 172 km2 of forests and subalpine and alpine grasslands along with scattered rock outcrops and scree slopes. The entire area has been protected from human impact (no hunting, fishing, camping or off-trail hiking) since 1914. Large, fairly homogenous patches of short- and tall-grass vegetation, which originate from different historical management and grazing regimes, cover the park’s subalpine grasslands entirely. Short-grass vegetation developed in areas where cattle used to rest (nutrient input) prior to the park’s foundation (14th century to 1914) (Schütz and others 2003, 2006) and is dominated by lawn grass species such as Festuca rubra L., Briza media L. and Agrostis capillaris L. (Schütz and others 2003, 2006). Today, this vegetation type is intensively grazed by diverse vertebrate and invertebrate communities that inhabit the park and consume up to 60% of the available biomass (Risch and others 2013). Tall-grass vegetation developed where cattle formerly grazed, but did not rest, and is dominated by rather nutrient-poor tussocks of Carex sempervirens Vill. and Nardus stricta L. (Schütz and others 2003, 2006). This vegetation type receives considerably less grazing, with only roughly 20% of the biomass consumed (Risch and others 2013). Consequently, the two vegetation types together represent a long-term trajectory of changes in grazing regimes. Underlying bedrock of all grasslands is dolomite, which renders these grasslands rather poor in nutrients regardless of former and current land-use regimes.
Experimental design
To progressively exclude aboveground vertebrate and invertebrate animals, we established 18 size-selective exclosure setups (nine in short-grass, nine in tall-grass vegetation) distributed over six subalpine grasslands across the SNP (Risch and others 2013, 2015). Elevation differences of exclosure locations did not exceed 350 m (between 1975 and 2300 m a.s.l.). The exclosures were established immediately after snowmelt in spring 2009 and were left in place for five consecutive growing seasons (until end of 2013). They were, however, temporarily dismantled every fall (late October after first snowfall) to protect them from avalanches. They were re-established in the same location every spring immediately after snowmelt. Each size-selective exclosure setup consisted of five plots (2 x 3 m) that progressively excluded aboveground vertebrates and invertebrates from large to small. The plots are labelled according to the guilds that had access to them “L/M/S/I”, “M/S/I”, “S/I”, “I”, “None”; L = large mammals, M = medium mammals, S = small mammals, I = invertebrates, None = no animals had access. As we only had permission to have the experimental setup in place for five consecutive growing seasons, the experiment had to be completely dismantled in the late fall of 2013 and all material removed from the SNP.
Our exclosure design was aimed at excluding mammalian herbivores, but naturally also excluded the few medium and small mammalian predators, as well as the entire aboveground invertebrate food web. A total of 26 large to small mammal species can be found in the SNP, but large apex predators are missing (wolf, bear, lynx) . Reptiles, amphibians and birds are scarce to absent in the subalpine grasslands under study. Only two reptile species occur in the park and they are confined to rocky areas that warm up enough for them to survive. One frog species spawns in an isolated pond far from our grasslands. Only three bird species occasionally feed on the subalpine grasslands. Using game cameras (Moultrie 6MP Game Spy I-60 Infrared Digital Game Camera, Moultrie Feeders, Alabaster, AL, USA), we did observe that the medium- and small-sized mammals (marmot/hares and mice) were not afraid to enter the fences and feed on their designated plots. We never spotted reptiles, amphibians or birds on camera. We distinguished between 59 higher aboveground-dwelling invertebrate taxa that our size-selective exclosures excluded (see also methods for aboveground-dwelling invertebrates below).
The “L/M/S/I” plot (not fenced) was located at least 5 m from the 2.1 m tall and 7 x 9 m large main electrical fence that enclosed the other four plots. The bottom wire of this fence was mounted at 0.5 m height and was not electrified to enable safe access for medium and small mammals, while fencing out the large ones. Within each main fence, we randomly established four 2 x 3 m plots separated by 1-m wide walkways from one another and from the main fence line: 1) the “M/S/I” plots were unfenced, allowing access to all but the large mammals; 2) the “S/I” plots (10 x 10 cm electrical mesh fence) excluded all medium-sized mammals. Note that the bottom 10 cm of this fence remained non-electrified to enable safe access for small mammals; 3) the “I” plots (2 x 2 cm metal mesh fence) excluded all mammals. We double-folded the mesh at the bottom 50 cm to reduce the mesh size to smaller than 1 x 1 cm openings; and 4) the “None” plots were surrounded by a 1 m tall mosquito net (1.5 x 2 mm) to exclude all animals. The top of the plot was covered with a mosquito-meshed wooden frame mounted to the corner posts (roof). We treated these plots a few times with biocompatible insecticide (Clean kill original, Eco Belle GmbH, Waldshut-Tiengen, Germany) to remove insects that might have entered during data collection or that hatched from the soil, but amounts were negligible and did not impact soil moisture conditions within these plots.
To assess whether the design of the “None” exclosure (mesh and roof) affected the response variables within the plots and, therefore, influenced the results, we established an additional six “micro-climate control” exclosures (one in each of the six grasslands) (Risch and others 2013, 2015). These exclosures were built as the “None” exclosures but were open at the bottom (20 cm) of the 3-m side of the fence facing away from the prevailing wind direction to allow invertebrates to enter. A 20-cm high and 3-m long strip of metal mesh was used to block access to small mammals. Thus, this construction allowed a comparable micro-climate to the “None” plots, but also a comparable feeding pressure by invertebrates to the “I” plots. We compared various properties within these exclosures against one another to assess if our construction altered the conditions in the “None” plots. We showed that differences in plant (e.g., vegetation height, aboveground biomass) and soil properties (e.g., soil temperature, moisture) found between the “I” and the “None” treatments were not due to the construction of the “None” exclosure, but a function of animal exclusions, although the amount of UV light reaching the plant canopy was significantly reduced (Risch and others 2013).
Aboveground invertebrate sampling
Aboveground invertebrates were sampled with two different methods to capture both ground- and plant-dwelling organisms: 1) we randomly placed two pitfall traps (67 mm in diameter, covered with a roof) filled with 20% propylene glycol in one 1 x 1 m subplot of the 2 x 3 m treatment plots in spring 2013 (May) and emptied them every two weeks until late September 2013 (Vandegehuchte and others 2017b, 2018). A pitfall trap consisted of a plastic cylinder (13 cm depth, 6.75 cm diameter). Within each cylinder we placed a 100 ml plastic vial with outer diameter 6.70 cm and on top of the cylinder we placed a plastic funnel to guide the invertebrates into the vials. Each trap was cover with a cone-shaped and transparent plastic roof to protect the trap from rain (Vandegehuchte and others 2017b, 2018). Note that in the “None” plots only one trap was placed as control to check for effectiveness of the exclosure. 2) We vacuumed all invertebrates from a 60 x 60 cm area on another 1 x 1 m subplot with a suction sampler (Vortis, Burkhard manufacturing CO, Ltd., Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, UK) every month from June to September 2013 (Vandegehuchte and others 2017b, 2018). For this purpose, we quickly placed a square plastic frame (60 x 60 x 40 cm) with a closable mosquito mesh sleeve attached to the top edge into the plot from the outside. The suction sample was then inserted into through the sleeve and operated for 45 s to collect the invertebrates (Vandegehuchte and others 2017b, 2018).
We sorted the ≈100 000 individuals collected with both methods by hand and identified each individual morphologically to the lowest taxonomic level feasible (59 taxa, including orders, suborders, subfamilies, families; phylum for Mollusca). These taxa belonged to the following feeding types: 19 herbivores, 16 detritivores, 9 predators, 8 mixed feeders, 5 omnivores and 2 non-classified feeders (or not feeding as adults) (Vandegehuchte and others 2017b). We summed the numbers from the two pitfall traps and the suction sampling over the course of the 2013 season to represent the aboveground invertebrate abundance and community composition of a plot. Note: we did not specifically attempt to catch flying invertebrates with e.g., sticky traps, thus a few flying insects may have been missed with our vacuum sampling approach.
Sampling of plant properties
The vascular plant species composition was assessed at peak biomass every summer (July) by estimating the frequency of occurrence of each species with the pin count method in each plot (Frank and McNaughton 1990). A total of 172 taxa occurred within our 90 plots and we calculated plant species richness for each plot separately. We used the 2013 data in this study. Plant quality was assessed every year in July and September; here we use plant quality at the end of the experiment (September 2013). Two 10 x 100 cm wide strips of vegetation per plot were clipped, combined, dried at 65°C, and ground (Pulverisette 16, Fritsch, Idar-Oberstein, Germany) to pass through a 0.5 mm sieve. Twenty randomly selected samples across all treatments were analysed for N (Leco TruSpec Analyser, Leco, St. Joseph, Michigan, USA) (Vandegehuchte and others 2015). Nitrogen concentrations of the other samples were then estimated from models established for the experiment and the entire SNP relating Fourier transform-near infrared reflectance (FT-NIR) spectra to the measured values of N using a multi-purpose FT-NIR spectrometer (Bruker Optics, Fällanden, Switzerland) (Vandegehuchte and others 2015). Root biomass was sampled every fall by collecting five 2.2 cm diameter x 10 cm deep soil samples (Giddings Machine Company, Windsor, CO, USA) per plot (450 samples year-1). The samples were dried at 30 °C and roots were sorted from the sample by hand. We sorted each sample for 1 h which allowed to retrieve over 90% of all roots present in the samples (Risch and others 2013). The roots were then dried at 65 °C for 48 and weighed to the nearest mg. We averaged the values per plot and used the 2013 data only in this study.
Sampling of edaphic communities
In 2009, 2010, and 2011 we collected three composited soil samples (5 cm diameter x 10 cm depth; AMS Samplers, American Falls, ID, USA) and assessed bacterial community structure using T-RFLP profiling (Liu and others 1997; Blackwood and others 2003; Hodel and others 2014). We detected a total of 89 operational taxonomic units (OTUs). These values are in accordance with other studies reporting OTU richness (Wirthner and others 2011; Zumsteg and others 2012; Meola and others 2014) using T-RFLP profiling, a method that detects the most abundant, and thus likely, the most relevant, taxa. We averaged the data over the three years of collections for our calculations. Microbial biomass carbon (MBC) was determined with the substrate-induced method (Anderson and Domsch 1978) every fall (September) between 2009 and 2013 by collecting three mineral soil samples (5 cm diameter × 10 cm mineral soil core, AMS Samplers, American Falls, ID, USA). The three samples were combined (90 samples for each sampling year), immediately put on ice, taken to the laboratory, passed through a 2-mm sieve and stored at 4°C. Again, we only used the 2013 data in this study.
Soil samples (5 cm diameter x 10 cm depth) to extract soil arthropods were collected in June, July, and August 2011 with a soil corer lined with a plastic sleeve to ensure an undisturbed sample (total of 270 samples). The plastic line core was immediately sealed on both ends using cling film and put into a cooler. All plots were sampled within three days and the extraction of arthropods started the evening of the sampling day using a high-gradient Tullgren funnel apparatus (Crossley and Blair 1991; Vandegehuchte and others 2015). Samples were kept in the extractor for four days and the soil arthropods were collected in 95% ethanol. All individuals were counted and each individual was identified morphologically to the lowest level feasible [76 taxa, including orders, suborders, subfamilies, families (Protura, Thysanoptera, Aphidina, Psylina, Coleoptera, Brachycera, Nematocera, Auchenorryncha, Heteroptera, Formicidae); sub-phylum for Myriapoda, for Acari and Collembola also including morpho-species). Note that we also included larval stages (nine of the 76 taxa) (Vandegehuchte and others 2015). All data were summed over the season. A detailed species list for mites and collembolans is published (Vandegehuchte and others 2017a) [https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118679.s001]. Earthworms are rare in the SNP and therefore were not included. We collected eight random 2.2 cm diameter x 10 cm deep soil cores from each plot in September 2013 to determine the soil nematode community composition. The samples were mixed and the nematodes were extracted from 100 ml of fresh soil using Oostenbrink elutriators (Oostenbrink 1960). All nematodes in a 1 ml of the 10 ml extract were counted, a minimum of 150 individuals sample-1 were identified to genus or family level using (Bongers 1988), the numbers of all nematodes were extrapolated to the entire sample and expressed for a 100 g dry sample. In total we identified 63 genus or family levels (Vandegehuchte and others 2015). The list of all the nematodes found is published (Vandegehuchte and others 2015) [http://www.oikosjournal.org/appendix/oik-03341] or DOI: [doi: 10.1111/oik.03341].
We are aware that sampling soil microbes from 2009 to 2011 and soil arthropods in 2011 was not ideal, but we are positive that this does not bias the results. Most of the parameters measured in our experiment either already showed a treatment response after the first growing season (e.g., plant biomass) or did not respond over the entire time experiment (e.g., microbial biomass C). The microbial community composition (2009 – 2011) was highly influenced by inter-annual differences in temperature and precipitation, but did not differ between treatments or vegetation types (Hodel and others 2014). We therefore felt comfortable using the 2009 through 2011 data for describing the soil microbial community in our experimental treatments. Similarly, we are positive that our soil arthropod data are representative. We did assess soil arthropods in August 2012 and found no differences to the August 2011 data. However, we did not feel comfortable combining the 2011 June, July, August data with only August data for 2012 for our analyses.
Sampling of soil properties
We collected three soil samples (5 cm diameter x 10 cm depth) in each plot in September 2013 after removing the vegetation. First, we collected the top layer of mineral soil rich in organic matter, the surface organic layer or rhizosphere, typically 1 to 3 cm in depth with a soil corer (AMS Samples, American Falls, Idaho, USA). Second, we collected a 10 cm mineral soil core beneath this surface layer. The cores for each layer were composited, dried at 65 °C for 48 h and fine-ground to pass a 0.5 mm screen. We then analysed all samples for total C using a Leco TruSpec Analyser (Leco, St. Joseph, Michigan, USA). Mineral soil pH was measured potentiometrically in 1:2 soil:CaCl2 solution with an equilibration time of 30 min.
Soil net N mineralisation was assessed during the 2013 growing season (Risch and others 2015). For this purpose, we randomly collected a 5 cm diameter x10 cm deep soil sample with a soil corer (AMS Samples, American Falls, Idaho, USA) after clipping the vegetation in June 2013. After weighing and sieving (4 mm mesh) the soil, we extracted a 20 g subsample in 1 mol l-1 KCl for 1.5 h on an end-over-end shaker and thereafter filtered it through ashless folded filter paper (DF 5895 150, ALBET LabScience, Hahnenmühle FineArt GmbH, Dassel, Germany). From these filtrates NO3- concentrations were measured colorimetrically (Norman and Stucki 1981) and NH4+with flow injection analysis (FIAS 300, Perkin Elmer, Waltham Massachusetts, USA) (Risch and others 2015). We dried the rest of the sample 105 °C to constant mass to determine fine,fraction bulk density. A second soil sample was collected within each plot in June 2013 with a corer lined with a 5 x 13 cm aluminium cylinder. The corer was driven 11.5 cm deep into the soil so that the top 1.5 cm of the cylinder remained empty. Into this space we placed a polyester bag (250 µm) filled an ion-exchanger resin to capture the incoming N. The bag was filled with a 1:1 mixture of acidic and alkaline exchanger resin (ion-exchanger I KA/ion exchanger IIIAA, Merck AG, Darmstadt, Germany). We then removed 1.5 cm soil at the bottom of the cylinder and placed a second resin exchanger bag into this space to capture the N leached from the soil column. To assure that the exchange resin was saturated with H+ and Cl- prior to filling the bags, the mixture was stirred with 1.2 ml l-1 HCl for 1 h and then rinsed with demineralized water until the electrical conductivity of the water reached 5 µm cm-1. The cylinder with the resin bags in place was reinserted into the soil with the top flush to the soil surface and incubated for three months. We recollected the cylinders in September 2013. Each resin bag and 20 g of sieved soil (4 mm mesh) from each cylinder were then separately extracted with KCl and NO3- and NH4+ concentrations were measured. Nitrate and NH4+ concentrations of all samples were then converted to a content basis by multiplying their values with fine fraction bulk density. Net N mineralisation was thereafter calculated as the difference between the N content of the samples collected at the end of the three-month incubation (including the N extracted from the bottom resin bag) and the N content at the beginning of the incubation (Risch and others 2015).
Soil CO2 emissions were measured every two weeks between 0900 and 1700 hrs from early May through late September 2013 with a PP-Systems SRC-1 soil respiration chamber (15 cm high, 10 cm diameter; closed circuit) attached to a PP-Systems EGM-4 infrared gas analyser (PP-Systems, Amesbury, MA, USA) on two locations per plot (Risch and others 2013). The chamber was placed on randomly placed, permanently installed PVC collars (10 cm diameter) driven 5 cm into the soil at the beginning of the study (Risch and others 2013). Freshly germinated plants growing within the collars were removed prior to each measurement to avoid measuring plant respiration or photosynthesis. The two measurements collected per plot and sampling date were averaged.
Soil moisture (with time domain reflectometry; Field-Scout TDR-100, Spectrum Technologies, Plainfield, Illionois, USA) and temperature (with a waterproof digital pocket thermometer; Barnstead International, Dubuque, Iowa, USA) were measured at five random locations per plot every two weeks during the growing seasons during the experiment for the 0 to 10 cm depth (Risch and others 2013, 2015). As soil moisture and soil temperature were highly negatively correlated (Risch and others 2013), we only used soil moisture for this study. We used plot-level averages of all values available to capture soil moisture variability during the five years of the experiment. The results remained unchanged when we only used soil moisture from the 2013 growing season.
Numeral calculations and statistical analyses
Ecosystem coupling. We conducted principal component analyses (PCAs; unscaled) at the complete dataset level using the abundances of each taxonomical entity to describe each of the five different communities used in this study: aboveground-dwelling invertebrates, vascular plants, soil microorganisms, soil arthropods and soil nematodes. We retained the first two components (PCA axis 1 and PCA axis 2) of each analysis as we found them to adequately represent the temporal and spatial variability of our 90 treatment plots in previous studies55,67. Together they explained a total of 71.70% of the variation for aboveground invertebrates, 44.36% for plants, 44.85% for soil microorganisms, 61.85% for soil arthropods and 77.19% for soil nematodes. In addition, we used soil pH and soil organic C content as a proxy for soil chemical properties, soil bulk density as a proxy for soil physical properties and soil moisture (negatively correlated with soil temperature) as a proxy for soil micro-climatic conditions for an overall total of fourteen constituents.
We calculated ecosystem coupling9 for each exclosure treatment within each vegetation type (i.e., 2  5 treatment combinations in total) as an integrated measure of pairwise ecological interactions between ecosystem constituents representing ecological communities and the soil abiotic environment. These ecological interactions are defined by non-parametric Spearman rank correlation analyses between two constituents, excluding interactions involving two abiotic constituents (e.g., soil pH vs. soil moisture) and interactions between the first (PC1) and second (PC2) component of each community type, as these are orthogonal by definition. Interactions between abiotic constituents were excluded from the analyses because the focus of our study was on communities and how they interact with one another and their surrounding environment; therefore, including abiotic-abiotic interactions was not of interest here. Given that the effectiveness of our experimental design resulted in that no community composition data of aboveground-dwelling invertebrates was available for the “None” plots (all animals excluded), only thirteen instead of fourteen constituents were included in the ecosystem coupling calculations for this treatment. The complete absence of aboveground invertebrates represents the most extreme case of disturbance between aboveground animal communities and the rest of the ecosystem constituents. This may have resulted in a slight overestimation of ecosystem coupling for these plots.
	Average ecosystem coupling was calculated as follows:
Ecosystem coupling=
where Xi is the absolute Coupling was calculated value of the Spearman’s rho coefficient of the ith correlation for each treatment within each vegetation type (i.e., based on nine replicates each), considering and n is the number of pairwise comparisons considered (n = a total of 80; interactions (56 in the case of the “None” treatment). We considered a total of 40 biotic-biotic interactions (i.e., concerning two community-level principal components such as plants and microbes; 24 in the case of the “None” treatment) and 40 abiotic-biotic (i.e., concerning one community-level principal component and one abiotic factor, e.g., plant community and soil properties; 32 in the case of the “None” treatment).	Coupling was calculated for each treatment within each vegetation type (i.e., based on nine replicates each), considering a total of 80 interactions (56 in the case of the “None” treatment). We considered a total of 40 biotic-biotic interactions (i.e., concerning two community-level principal components such as plants and microbes; 24 in the case of the “None” treatment) and 40 abiotic-biotic (i.e., concerning one community-level principal component and one abiotic factor, e.g., plant community and soil properties; 32 in the case of the “None” treatment).
To establish whether constituents were significantly and positively coupled within treatments (i.e., the average of their correlation coefficients were greater than in a null model where correlation only happens by chance), we calculated one-tailed p-values based on permutation tests with 999 permutations.

We considered six ecosystem functions and process rates commonly used to assess ecosystem functioning (Meyer and others 2015; Manning and others 2018). Plant N content represents a measure of forage quality, while plant richness has been shown to stabilise biomass production, thus allowing the system to respond to changes in herbivory. Soil net N mineralisation, soil respiration, root biomass, and microbial biomass represent fluxes or stocks of energy. For all functions and processes higher values represent higher functioning (Manning and others 2018). All these variables were measured in the last year of the experiment (2013). We then quantified ecosystem multifunctionality using the multiple threshold approach (Byrnes and others 2014; Manning and others 2018), which considers the number of functions that are above a certain threshold, over a series of threshold values (typically 10-99%) that are defined based on the maximum value of each function. We weighted all our functions equally for these calculations (Manning and others 2018). The number of functions in a plot with values higher than a given threshold value for the respective function is summed up. The sum represents ecosystem multifunctionality for that plot. Given that choosing any particular threshold as a measure of ecosystem multifunctionality is arbitrary, we calculated the average of thresholds from 10-90% (in 10% intervals) as a more integrated representation of ecosystem multifunctionality.
We used Pearson correlations to explore the relationships between ecosystem coupling (all interactions, biotic-biotic interactions, abiotic-biotic interactions involving above- and belowground constituents, and all interactions, biotic-biotic interactions, abiotic-biotic interactions involving belowground constituents only) and ecosystem multifunctionality by calculating the slopes of all relationships between ecosystem coupling and multifunctionality for all thresholds between 10 and 99%. We also related ecosystem coupling with the average of multifunctionality at thresholds between 30-80% as explained before and considered this correlation as a robust indication of the type of association between these two variables. In addition, we explored the relationships between ecosystem coupling (all interactions, biotic-biotic interactions, abiotic-biotic interactions involving above- and belowground constituents, and all interactions, biotic-biotic interactions, abiotic-biotic interactions involving belowground constituents only) and individual ecosystem functions. The effects of exclosures and vegetation type on individual functions and multifunctionality were evaluated using linear mixed effects models ('lme' function of the nlme package), with exclosure and vegetation type as fixed effects and fence as a random factor. All statistical analyses and numerical calculations were done in R version 3.4.0 (R Core Team 2016).

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en: Ecosystem coupling and multifunctionality - exclosure experiment