3.4 Sensitivity analysis of shrub species’ response to stocking
rate
The response of the four shrubs to the stocking rate gradient is shown
in Figure 7. The above analysis indicated that the height and coverage
of the shrubs decreased significantly with increasing stocking rate, but
the correspondence analysis in Figure 6 indicates that Artemisia
frigida , Kochia prostrata , Caragana microphylla andCeratoides latens had significantly different responses to
stocking rate. In general, Artemisia frigida and Ceratoides
latens were the most sensitive to stocking rate, followed byCaragana microphylla , and finally Kochia prostrata .Kochia prostrata was the most resistant to grazing, followed byCaragana microphylla . Furthermore, the first dimension explained
82.64% and the second dimension explained 21.39%, which indicated that
two dimensions were able to account for 93.4% of the data and can
reflect the information of the original data.