Plant traits in influencing soil moisture in semiarid grasslands of the Loess Plateau, China

Large-scale vegetation restoration projects pose threats to water resource security in water-limited regions. Thus, the quantification of how vegetation cover affects soil moisture is of key importance to support effective restoration schemes in drylands. However, the current understanding of such effects remains poor. For this study, an in-situ vegetation-removal experiment was conducted at 36 herbaceous grassland sites having different...