Temperate Grassland Productivity Responses to Rainfall and Defoliation Over 21 Months

A 21-month factorial field experiment in a temperate mixed pasture combined contrasting rainfall regimes with two clipping frequencies. The data set, authored by Ephrem Ngendahimana and last updated in June 2026, demonstrates rainfall as the primary driver of above- and belowground productivity, canopy recovery, and root carbon dynamics.

Use Cases

• Modeling aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) responses based on rainfall and defoliation frequency.
• Analyzing trade-offs in carbon partitioning between above- and belowground productivity under drought stress.
• Comparing resilience of plant functional groups like legumes and deep-rooted forbs to combined drought and defoliation.
• Investigating seasonal vulnerability of productivity during the spring peak growing period.

Strengths

• 21-month factorial field experiment provides controlled environmental data.
• Explicitly measures both above- and belowground productivity and carbon dynamics.
• Data is licensed under CC-BY-4.0 for open reuse.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• The 456.2 KB file size suggests a limited scope of data.

Provenance

Source

figshare

Collection Method

Factorial field experiment combining rainfall regimes and clipping frequencies.

Time Range

21-month experiment.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-01 05:00:22; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Temperate mixed pasture (location unspecified).