Note: Equation form is\(ln(Y)=ln(c)+a\bullet ln(X_{1})+b\bullet ln(X_{2})\), where Y is dry mass (g) of shrub component; a, b and ln(c) are equation parameters with their respective standard error S.E.(a, b, ln(c)); X1 and X2 are equation variables with crown area (C), basal diameter (D), height (H), or age (A). R2 (adj): is the adjusted coefficient of determination; p-value is the significance of regression; AIC is the Akaike information criterion, and RE is the relative error.

Figure legends

FIGURE 1 Partitioning of biomass among different shrub components in age class 0-20, 21-30, and 31-50 years, respectively. n=12, 31 and 13 individuals for age class 0-20, 21-30, and 31-50 years, respectively.
FIGURE 2 Relationship between above- and below-ground biomass.
FIGURE 3 Biomass partitioning of S. passerinalog10-transformed data.
Note: (a) above-ground biomass (MA) vs. root biomass (MR); (b) branch biomass (MB) vs. MR; (c) foliage biomass (ML) vs. MR and (d) ML vs. MB. Each circle on the graph represents one shrub.
FIGURE 4 Scaling exponents of different biomass partitioning relations for three age classes.
Note: Small letters indicate significant difference among age class (P <0.05). The error bars indicate the standard errors of the scaling exponent per age class.