TY - JOUR
T1 - Nutrients exported from upland stream water enlarge perennial biomass crops
AU - Chiwa, Masaaki
AU - Utsumi, Yasuhiro
AU - Tashiro, Naoaki
AU - Yasuda, Yuko
AU - Shinozuka, Ken’ichi
AU - Ru, Yang
AU - Nagano, Nao
AU - Murata, Shusuke
AU - Nakamura, Takuma
AU - Yamauchi, Kohei
AU - Kabemura, Yuji
AU - Ando, Tatsuro
AU - Sawamura, Hiroshi
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank the town of Ashoro for providing information on the location of the field of Rawanbuki plants. We also thank Karibu Fukuzawa of Hokkaido University, who helped with the measurements of dissolved nitrogen in a KCl solution. This study was financially supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant numbers JP17H03833 and JP20K21338.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s).
PY - 2021/12
Y1 - 2021/12
N2 - Rawanbuki, a variety of Japanese butterbur (Petasites japonicus subsp. giganteus), grow naturally along the Rawan River, Hokkaido, northern Japan. Most plants reach 2–3 m in height and 10 cm in diameter in 2 months and are much larger than those grown along other rivers. We examined the hypothesis that nutrients exported from upland streams enhance the growth of the Rawanbuki. Nutrient concentrations, including nitrogen, phosphorus, and base cations, in the Rawan River were much higher than those in rivers of adjacent watersheds. High nutrient concentrations and moisture contents were found in soil along the Rawan River and a significant relationship was found between physicochemical soil conditions and aboveground biomass of butterburs. This indicates that extremely large Rawanbuki plants could be caused by these high nutrient concentrations and moisture contents in the soils. A manipulation experiment showed that fertilization simulated the growth environment along the Rawan River and enhanced the stem height and stem diameter of butterburs. This study concluded that the extremely large butterburs are caused by a large amount of nutrients exported from upland areas. These results are the first demonstration of the role of stream water nutrients in enlarging agricultural crops.
AB - Rawanbuki, a variety of Japanese butterbur (Petasites japonicus subsp. giganteus), grow naturally along the Rawan River, Hokkaido, northern Japan. Most plants reach 2–3 m in height and 10 cm in diameter in 2 months and are much larger than those grown along other rivers. We examined the hypothesis that nutrients exported from upland streams enhance the growth of the Rawanbuki. Nutrient concentrations, including nitrogen, phosphorus, and base cations, in the Rawan River were much higher than those in rivers of adjacent watersheds. High nutrient concentrations and moisture contents were found in soil along the Rawan River and a significant relationship was found between physicochemical soil conditions and aboveground biomass of butterburs. This indicates that extremely large Rawanbuki plants could be caused by these high nutrient concentrations and moisture contents in the soils. A manipulation experiment showed that fertilization simulated the growth environment along the Rawan River and enhanced the stem height and stem diameter of butterburs. This study concluded that the extremely large butterburs are caused by a large amount of nutrients exported from upland areas. These results are the first demonstration of the role of stream water nutrients in enlarging agricultural crops.
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U2 - 10.1038/s41598-021-81191-x
DO - 10.1038/s41598-021-81191-x
M3 - Article
C2 - 33495492
AN - SCOPUS:85099744711
SN - 2045-2322
VL - 11
JO - Scientific Reports
JF - Scientific Reports
IS - 1
M1 - 2200
ER -