Responses of grassland herbaceous clonal species to light, temperature, water, fertilizers and grazing presure gradients

Responses of clonal herbaceous species to temperature, light, water, fertilizers and grazing pressure gradients are great significant for researchs of the clone community ecology. The effects of these ecological factors on clonal herbaceous species are popular research subjects in this fields, such as global change, sustainable development, biological invasions, etc. The responses of typical representative herbaceous clonal plants (such as stoloniferous and rhizomatous clonal plants) to these five factors in the environment with homogeneous and heterogeneous resource patches showed unique adaptive behaviour and manner, including riskspreading strategy of genets, phenotypic plasticity, the foraging behaviour, clonal integration, clonal division and fitness. This paper analyzed and summarized domestic and international cases of clonal herbaceous plants in response to light, temperature, water, fertilizer and grazing gradients in recent years. Several current subjects were also discussed such as phenotypic plasticity, clonal integration, and clone division.