Unraveling the drivers of forage quality variation in the Serengeti.

ABSTRACT: Variation in forage quality is a key dimension of herbivore resource partitioning, but the main determinants of such variation across environmental gradients remain poorly understood. It is especially unclear how much variation in plant nutrient contents and stoichiometry is driven by plant species turnover versus by intraspecific variation across sites. We investigated variation in forage quality across nine sites along a key environmental gradient of increasing rainfall and decreasing soil fertility in the Serengeti National Park, Tanzania. We compared leaf elemental contents of nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K), calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), and sodium (Na) and three nutrient ratios (N:P, Ca:P, and K:Na) between sites, between species within the same site, and between sites wi

SUBMITTER: Li Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12287624 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature