A two-year field study led by WANG Yongcui from the Institute of Applied Ecology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has identified how native vegetation configurations influence the recovery and stability of desertified grasslands at different stages of degradation.

The findings, published in Plant and Soil, suggest that the initial severity of desertification strongly influences restoration outcomes, with moderately degraded grasslands showing the most pronounced response.

Grassland desertification poses a significant ecological challenge in semi-arid regions, where vegetation loss and soil degradation diminish biodiversity and impair critical ecosystem functions, including nutrient cycling and water retention. Restoring these systems requires reestablishing not only aboveground plant communities, but also rebuilding soil seed banks. These banks consist of viable seeds stored in the soil that play a critical role in natural regeneration. However, the process of selecting effective native plant combinations across different stages of degradation is not well understood.

To address this issue, the researchers conducted in situ restoration experiments in the Zhanggutai area on the southern margin of the Horqin Sandy Land, a representative region of desertified grasslands in northern China. The study included sites that were lightly, moderately, or severely desertified, with treatments consisting of an unplanted control and two configurations that added two native species using locally adapted plants. From 2024 to 2025, the researchers monitored the characteristics of the aboveground vegetation and the soil seed bank.

The researchers found that the effectiveness of native species addition varied significantly with the degree of desertification. Moderately desertified grasslands showed the strongest and most sustained improvements, with substantial increases in plant species richness, vegetation cover, and density under near-natural vegetation configurations. These treatments also significantly enhanced the species composition similarity between aboveground vegetation and soil seed banks, indicating a tighter coupling between the two components and a stronger capacity for self-regeneration.

In contrast, lightly desertified grasslands showed a limited response to restoration treatments. This was largely due to the competitive dominance of existing species, which constrained the establishment of newly introduced plants. Severely desertified grasslands responded more slowly because harsh abiotic conditions, such as low soil fertility and water deficiency, limited vegetation recovery.

Further analysis revealed that soil seed bank diversity gradually increased under restoration treatments and that improvements in community structure were associated with the incorporation of key native species, such as Lespedeza davurica and Allium ramosum. The researchers also noted that combining shrubs and herbaceous species enhanced functional complementarity, thereby improving overall ecosystem stability and resistance to disturbance.

This study emphasizes that moderately desertified grasslands are critical for ecological restoration because targeted native vegetation configurations can rapidly rebuild plant communities and strengthen vegetation–seed bank linkages.

While restoration in lightly and severely degraded systems faces constraints from biotic competition and abiotic stress, respectively, the findings emphasize the importance of tailoring restoration strategies to site-specific conditions.