Climate change and primary production: Forty years in a bunchgrass prairie

increase in invasives was largely due to non-native annual brome grasses, which comprised on average 50% of invasives. Number of invasive grass species increased from 1 to 3, and invasive dicots increased from 3 to 10 species. Environmental correlates Nitrogen availability. Warm and cool season total nitrogen were not correlated with prior season’s total nitrogen (respectively, P < 0.92 and 0.88), suggesting that nitrogen does not accumulate. Summer (June–July) temperature and sample site elevation were positively correlated with warm season total nitrogen (Table 3). Fig 5. NBR plant species composition based on point frame incidence since 1997 for two sites. a) trends over time in percentage of grass composition for bluegrasses and wheatgrasses; b) trends over time in plant species richness; c) trends over time in plant Shannon diversity. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0243496.g005 PLOS ONE Bunchgrass prairie and climate change PLOS ONE | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0243496 December 23, 2020 10 / 21