全 文 ：Distribution of Main Nutrients in Seedlings of
Umbrella Bamboo (Fargesia murielae) at Its
Native Home in Central China
Ling WANG, Kun LI, Yinping MENG, Liya ZHAO, Zhaohua LI*
School of Resources and Environmental Science, Hubei University, Wuhan 430062, China
Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (31070370).
*Corresponding author. E-mail: wlk_211@126.com
Received: March 8, 2012 Accepted: June 30, 2012A
Agricultural Science & Technology, 2012, 13(7): 1469-1472
Copyright訫 2012, Information Institute of HAAS. All rights reserved Soil and Fertilizer
Abstract [Objective] The paper was to study the distribution of main nutrients in
seedlings of umbrella bamboo (Fargesia murielae) in Shennongjia National Nature
Reserve. [Method] The study was conducted in Liangfengya of Shennongjia National
Nature Reserve. In the field investigation, six clumps of umbrella bamboo grown in-
dependently were randomly selected and sampled. The total nitrogen, total phospho-
rus and total potassium of umbrella bamboo were detected by regular plant analysis
method. The age classes of bamboo seedlings were ascertained by age grade
backtracking method. [Result] In different organs, N, P, K contents in branches and
leaves were significantly higher that than in stems. Along age grades, N and P
contents performed M shape in branches and leaves, while K content approxi-
mately performed as normal distribution. [Conclusion] The nutrients distribution pattern
of these seedlings is likely formed by its nutrition mechanism which allocates nutri-
ents according to different needs or by external interference of environmental fea-
tures. However, the specific causes still need further investigation.
Key words Fargesia murielae; Nutrition mechanism; Age grade; Nutrient distribution
N utrients, such as nitrogen,phosphorus and potassium,play important roles in plant
life history, since biological cycling and
nutrients accumulating is the basic
process to generate organic matter.
The nutrition storage is not only direct-
ly related to plant growth and biomass,
but also closely related to nutrition cy-
cling pattern in population system [1].
Therefore, the accumulation and dis-
tribution process of nutrients is also an
ecological process, which indicates the
uptake and consumption of nutrients
in plant community [2 -3]. Some resea-
rches have been given to common
bamboo species such as Phyllosta-
chys pubes-cens [4], Pleioblastus ama-
rus [5], Ph. Pra-ecox [6], Dendrocalamus
latiflorus [7] and Fargesia denudate [ 8 ] .
Nevertheless , umbrella bamboo (Far-
gesia murielae), one of the most pop-
ular garden bamboos in western coun-
tries introduced from China, has not
been concerned in its native home.
Umbrella bamboo is naturally en-
demic in Shennongjia National Nature
Reserve at Hubei Province in Central
China. The population synchronously
flowered and died back in the years of
1996-2000 [9-10]. During its flowering
period, a detailed study on the nutrition
dynamics of N, P and K had been
conducted before and after the flower-
ing stage. The results showed that N
and K contents reduced and P content
increased during flowering stage [11].
The existing F. murielae seedlings in
the research site were regenerated
from seeds, and now it has entered to
the transition stage from renewed
seedlings to cloning population. Re-
searching the nutrients distribution
features of F. murielae in this stage
can make a better understanding of
the physiological characteristics of nu-
trition accumulation and allocation. By
connecting with the former research
about the nutrient changes during the
flowering stage, the nutrient cycle
could be matched to the life history of
umbrella bamboo, thereby the nutrition
cycling mechanism during the bamboo
population dynamics might be figured
out.
Materials and Methods
Survey area
The study was conducted in
Liangfengya (31°26′ N, 110°14′ E,
2 723 m altitude), Shennongjia Na-
tional Nature Reserve, the west part of
Hubei Province, Central China, shown
as Fig.1. With mountain slopes around
20-30°, the study area has a monsoon
climate of north subtropics, with
cloudy, high humidity and heavy wind.
The annual average temperature is
above 0 ℃ in most areas, and the av-
erage temperature is over 18 ℃ during
the warmest days in July, with a frost-
free season of 100-120 d and a long
freeze-up. The peak annual rainfall is
up to 2 500 mm. The soil type is
meadow burozem with thick humus
layer. Umbrella bamboo in survey area
is assumed to be wild but not farmed,
and covered by a thin grass layer with-
out trees or shrub.
Methods
Field investigation The field inves-
tigation on the umbrella bamboo
seedlings was recorded in August
2011. In the site, six clumps of um-
brella bamboo grown independently
were randomly selected and labeled.
The age classes of bamboo seedlings
were ascertained by age grade back-
tracking method, and the samples
were collected in envelopes with nu-
meric marks. Umbrella bamboo
branches are tenuous and closely
DOI:10.16175/j.cnki.1009-4229.2012.07.037
Agricultural Science & Technology
Agricultural Science & Technology Vol.13, No.7, 2012
2012
Table 1 Nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium contents in umbrella bamboo (Fargesia
murielae)
Age
N∥g/kg P∥g/kg K∥g/kg
Branches and
leaves Stems
Branches and
leaves Stems
Branches and
leaves Stems
1 7.4230 1.029 6.215
2 12.876 2.128 1.643 0.413 6.775 2.099
3 14.758 2.807 1.831 0.522 7.061 1.970
4 13.683 2.323 1.545 0.564 6.788 2.239
5 15.564 2.554 1.805 0.592 6.526 1.980
6 14.304 2.398 1.545 0.576 6.170 2.006
connected with leaves, it is hard to
separate, therefore branches and
leaves were made as one object.
Experimental methods All the
samples were cleaned by distilled wa-
ter and deactivated in 105 ℃ drying
oven with forced convection for 30
min. The drying oven was turned down
to 60-70 ℃ for drying, and the sam-
ples were smashed and passed
through a 100 mesh griddle for nutri-
ents analysis. All the samples were di-
gested by H2SO4·H2O2, total N, total P
and total K were analyzed by regular
soil analysis method[12-14]. All the analy-
ses contained four paralleled groups.
Statistical analysis Data of total N,
total P and total K of umbrella bamboo
seedlings of different age classes were
analyzed by regression analysis, by
using the statistical software SPSS
Statistics 17.0[15-17].
Results and Analysis
Nutrients in different organs
Nitrogen, phosphorus and potas-
sium are essential elements for plant
growth, and the elements absorbed by
plants are also obviously different be-
tween stems and branches & leaves,
the details were shown in Table 1.
Table 1 showed that the average
contents of three elements in branches
and leaves were N > K > P, the aver-
age contents of N, P, K were 14.24,
1.67 and 6.66 g/kg in branches and
leaves, and 2.44, 0.53 and 2.06 g/kg in
stems, respectively. Nitrogen mainly
promotes the growth of stems and
leaves. Phosphorus is dominated at
promoting root development and ac-
celerating cell division, which is benefi-
cial for flowering and early maturity.
Potassium quickens metabolism, ma-
kes plants stem strong, improves pho-
tosynthesis, and increases the effi-
ciency of absorption and the use of Ni-
trogen [18]. The seedlings of umbrella
bamboo in research site are descend-
ed from the seeds flowered among the
year of 1996-2000, and it is in its early
stage of asexual reproduction cycle.
Therefore, some elements which are
beneficial to the growth of plant are
accumulating such as N, K, while other
elements which inhibit the growth of
the plants and the acceleration of the
maturity of reproductive organs (like P)
are in low concentration.
A great variety of nutrient formu-
lation has been analyzed in the culture
of plant organs. This variety reflects
the different plant parts, as well as the
diversity functions of these parts [19].
The nutrient percentage in different
organs of umbrella bamboo also sh-
ows obvious differences between
samples（Fig.2）.
As shown in Fig.2, the average
percentage of N, P, K in branches and
leaves were all significantly higher
than in stems. In branches and leaves,
the average percentages of N, P and K
were 85.37% , 75.83% and 75.83%
respectively, while 14.63% , 24.17%
and 24.17% were in stems. Bamboo
leaf is specialized for photosynthesis,
which is the primary organ for me-
tabolism of nutrients; meanwhile, me-
tabolic rate in stems is weaker than in
leaves with less accumulation of nutri-
ents as well. Therefore, the content of
N, P and K in branches and leaves
was obviously higher than in stems.
Nutrients in different age grades
Distribution and accumulation of
nutrients content of F. murielae along
different age grades were shown in
Fig. 3. As shown in Fig.3, the variation
trend of N, P contents along age
grades presented ‘M’ shape, the
content of age 3, 5 was higher than the
age of 1, 2, 4 and 6. K contents chang-
ing tendency presented normal distri-
bution, the content of age 3 was higher
than other ages, while the regularity in
stems was not obvious. The research
samples were taken on August 1,
2011, three months after bamboo
shoots came out of the ground in May.
It means that the newborn shoot was
still in the state of exuberant growth.
Therefore, the nutrients content was
significantly lower than the predicted
value, thus it could not be expected
that the nutrients content of newborn
shoot showed regularity during its
growing.
Discussions
Nitrogen, phosphorus and potas-
sium contents of umbrella bamboo in
Fig.1 The Geographic location of research site
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Vol.13, No.7, 2012 Agricultural Science & Technology
2012
Fig.4 Nitrogen distribution and lateral bud survival rate along age grades
Fig.2 Nutrients percentage of different organs of umbrella bamboo (Fargesia murielae)
Fig.3 Nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium distributions along age grades
causing the major or minor year law of
umbrella bamboo, and it is most likely
that the sprouting quality raises this
changes.
After observation and statistics,
the sprouting bamboo shoots of um-
brella bamboo from mother bamboo
cannot spread all branches and leaves
to grow into adult bamboo, sometimes
grow into degraded shoots. The ratio
of grown bamboo shoots amount to
entire sprouting amount is defined as
lateral bud survival rate. Compared
with the ‘M’ shape, the survival rate of
lateral buds was inversely proportional
to the contents of N, P in branches and
leaves (Fig.4). That means the lateral
bud survival rate of umbrella bamboo
is higher in major year and the amount
of grown bamboo shoots is relatively
larger, then bamboo forest exhausts
nutrients, which makes the bamboo
shoots next year lack nutrition and
can’t be completely survived, and it re-
sults in low survival rate of lateral bud
in minor year; then nutrients are accu-
mulated during minor year which pre-
pares for mass grown bamboo shoots
in the next year. However, whether the
approximate nutrition law of major or
minor year can continue still needs
long term observation to identify.
In addition, the seedlings of um-
brella bamboo in research site are re-
generated from seeds, and it is right in
transitional stage from renewed seed-
lings to cloning population, so the rate
of vegetative propagation is accelerat-
ed and the nutrients of N, K beneficial
to the growth of plant are absorbed
strongly. The nutrients storage of plant
community is mainly determined by
plant biomass and nutrients content,
which is an important index of plant
growth potential [8]. Umbrella bamboo
is a typical dwarf bamboo at high alti-
tude area, has a concentrated distribu-
tion in Shennongjia. It has a significant
ecological value for ecological envi-
ronment maintenance of high eleva-
tion regions. Next, we will combine
with the biomass research of umbrella
bamboo and vegetation coverage to
different organs and age grades pre-
sent non-uniform distribution. N, P and
K contents in branches and leaves of
umbrella bamboo were significantly
higher than in stems, and the average
contents of three elements in branches
and leaves presented N>K>P. These
results were similar to the study of
common bamboo species [5-8], but the
contents percentage was slightly dif-
ferent. It indicated that nutrients per-
centage of plants depended on the
varieties and qualities of plants[20].
The variation trend of N, P con-
tents along age grades presented ‘M’
shape while the stems regularity was
not obvious, this result is similar to the
major or minor year law of Phyl-
lostachys pubescens[21-22], so it means
that pure forest of F. murielae is likely
to display the analogous major or mi-
nor year law. The major or minor year
law of Ph. pubescens is a nutrition is-
sue, that is to say, a large number of
bamboo shoots sprout during major
year, then bamboo forest exhausts
nutrients, which affects the bamboo
shoots next year and results in minor
year; then nutrients are accumulated
during minor year which prepares for
mass bamboo shoots in the next year,
it goes round and round to form a cycle
of major or minor year law[21]. Different
from Ph. pubescens, umbrella bamboo
is clumping bamboo of sympodial rhi-
zomes, and the culm-base of mother
bamboo usually sprouts two bamboo
shoots, so the sprouting amount of
bamboo shoots isn’t the main factor
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Agricultural Science & Technology
Agricultural Science & Technology Vol.13, No.7, 2012
2012
华中神农箭竹更新苗主要营养元素的分布
王玲，李昆，孟银萍，赵丽雅，李兆华* （湖北大学资源环境学院，湖北武汉 430062）
摘 要 [目的] 研究神农架自然保护区内的神农箭竹更新苗主要营养元素的分布结构。[方法] 在神农架国家自然保护区内凉风垭设置样地，随
机选取六丛独立生长的神农箭竹并完整取样，采用常规植物营养分析方法测定氮、磷、钾含量，神农箭竹更新苗的龄级采用倒逐龄法确定。[结果]
在神农箭竹不同器官中，枝叶中 N、P、K的含量均明显高于秆中的含量；不同龄级营养元素的分布规律为枝叶中的 N、P元素含量随龄级增长均呈
类M型变化，K含量分布近似正态分布。[结论] 神农箭可能是由自身固有的营养机制使其根据不同生长需求分配营养元素或由外部环境因素的
干扰形成，但具体的原因还需进一步的研究调查。
关键词 神农箭竹；营养机制；龄级分布；养分分配
基金项目 国家自然科学基金(31070370)。
作者简介 王玲（1987-），女，湖北襄阳人，硕士研究生，研究方向为植物生态学，E-mail: wlk_211@126.com。*通讯作者。
收稿日期 2012-03-08 修回日期 2012-06-30
*******************************************************
Responsible editor: Jianli YIN Responsible proofreader: Xiaoyan WU
estimate the nutrients storage and
growth potential of this plant groups,
and lead the study of the foraging reg-
ularity of umbrella bamboo go further.
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