Background The Shui are a small Chinese sociolinguistic group living in Sandu Shui Autonomous County, south of Guizhou Province. The Shui people have accumulated and developed rich traditional medicinal knowledge, which has played a significant role in their healthcare. Traditional ethnic herbal medicines, like Shui ethnomedicine, have become an important resource of rural development in Guizhou Province. However, not much research has been conducted to document the medicinal plants traditionally used by the Shui people. This study's aims are (1) to record the current use of medicinal plants in Sandu County and associated traditional knowledge, including the medicinal plant species used and the types of diseases treated by local healers and any unique aspects of their preparations; (2) to analyze the most important medicinal plant species using relative frequency of citation (RFC); and (3) to provide useful information and data for possible future development and application of ethnomedicine and promote the conservation and preservation of Shui traditional medicinal knowledge. Methods Field surveys were conducted between July 2015 and August 2022 in Sandu County. A total of 15 local healers as key informants were interviewed. An additional 132 informants from villages and local markets were also interviewed through semistructured interviews and focal group discussions. Local Shui healers were followed during their collection of medicinal plants in the fields and recorded the medicinal plants' names, uses, and parts used. An ANOVA was used to evaluate the number of medicinal plants recognized by local healers across age-groups and townships, and relative frequencies of citation values were determined for the recorded medicinal plants. Results In this study, data collected from 15 Shui healers and 132 other informants were analyzed. The healers used fresh or dried parts of 505 plant species as medicine to treat a wide range of conditions and diseases. These plants belong to 405 genera from 156 families, with Fabaceae being the highest represented plant family. The Jiuqian township had the highest distribution of per capita healers (pch); only one local healer was in Zhonghe. Of the 15 local healers, only two were younger than 40 years of age. There is a major concern that traditional medicinal knowledge may be lost if there are not sufficient trainees or suitable successors. Among the common medicinal plants, most are herbaceous and the Shui typically use the whole plant in their medicines. There are 85 different recorded diseases treated by Shui medicinal plants, and among them, rheumatism and bone fractures have the largest number of species used. Three medicinal plant species, Isodon amethystoides, Asarum insigne, and Acorus tatarinowii, are the most commonly used ethnomedicines by the Shui people. Conclusion This study demonstrated that Shui people have extensive knowledge of a diverse range of medicinal plants, many of which had not been systematically recorded before the current study. Further research on the chemistry, pharmacology, and toxicity of Shui medicinal plants will be useful for developing functional foods or pharmaceutical products, particularly those of Isodon amethystoides, Asarum insigne, and Acorus tatarinowii. Additionally, as a result of rapid economic growth, fewer young people in Shui communities pursue traditional medicinal studies. Only 15 traditional Shui healers remain in the county, and only two of them are below the age of 40 years. Therefore, to conserve Shui's traditional medicinal knowledge, initiatives and policies are required to regenerate, strengthen, and promote Shui medicinal knowledge.

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In karst ecosystems, plants absorbing smaller amounts of nutrients, owing to shallow soil, show limited growth. In addition, fine roots (diameter -2 and 47.34 to 86.94 g m -2 , respectively. The total mass of fine roots and their production ranged from 187.00 to 303.11 g m -2 and 55.74 to 100.84 g m -2 year -1 , respectively. They showed a single peak across the vegetation restoration gradient. The fine root biomass and total fine root mass also showed a single peak with seasonal change. In autumn, the fine root biomass was high, whereas the necromass was low. Most of the fine roots were concentrated in the surface soil layer (0-10 cm), which accounted more than 57% root biomass, and decreased with increasing soil depth. In addition, fine root production showed a similar vertical pattern of variation with biomass. Overall, our results suggested that fine roots show clear seasonal and vertical changes with vegetation succession. Moreover, there was a higher seasonal fluctuation and a greater vertical decreasing trend in late-successional stages than in the early-successional stages. The conversion of degraded land to forest could improve the productivity of underground ecosystems and vegetation restoration projects in the fragile karst region should, therefore, continue.

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Paddy soils have been widely recognized as important carbon sinks. However, paddy field abandonment is increasing in the hilly area in subtropical China. Soil waterlogging and weed burning are common practices in abandoned paddy fields, which could affect vegetation cover and carbon sequestration. An rice cultivation experiment was ceased in 2006, and four new treatments were applied as waterlogging (W), drainage (D), waterlogging combined with burning (WB), and drainage combined with burning (DB). Waterlogging altered the vegetation cover and caused an associated change in biomass. Paspalum paspaloides, Murdannia triquetra, and Bidens frondosa dominated W and WB plots, and Microstegium vimineum and Bidens frondosa dominated D and DB plots. Abandonment of paddy fields led to a rapid decrease in soil organic carbon (SOC), and waterlogging accelerates SOC loss which should be attributed mainly to alteration of the vegetation cover. Six years' rice cultivation increased SOC content by 13.5% (2.4 g kg -1 ) on average. In contrast, six years' abandonment reduced SOC content by 14.5% (3.0 g kg -1 ) on average. Decline rate of SOC was 0.38, 0.64, 0.30, and 0.65 g kg -1 a -1 for D, W, DB, and WB, respectively. Such results indicate a significant risk of SOC loss from abandoned paddy fields.

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Triquetrous murdannia is an annual weed commonly found in rice fields in China. Laboratory and screenhouse experiments were carried out to determine the effect of light, temperature, osmotic and salt stress, seed burial depth, amount of rice residue, and depth of flooding on seed germination and seedling emergence of triquetrous murdannia and to evaluate the response of this weed to commonly available POST herbicides in China. Germination was greater than 93% under a wide day/night temperature range of 20/10 to 30/20 C in the light/dark regime. The time to onset of germination decreased as temperature increased. Germination was slightly stimulated when seeds were placed in light/dark conditions compared with seeds placed in the dark. The osmotic potential and NaCl concentration required for 50% inhibition of maximum germination were -0.5 MPa and 122 mM, respectively. The highest germination (68%) was observed from seeds sown on the soil surface, but decreased with increasing burial depth. Only 7% of seedlings emerged from a depth of 4 cm, and no seedlings emerged from seeds buried deeper than 6 cm. Seedling emergence decreased from 93 to 35% with increasing quantity of rice residue (1 to 6 10³ kg ha⁻¹) applied on the soil surface. Seedling emergence was reduced by 40, 48, 64, and 70% at flooding depths of 1, 2, 4, and 6 cm, respectively, for the seeds sown on the soil surface. Fluroxypyr and MCPA herbicides provided 100% control of triquetrous murdannia at the 2- to 6-leaf stages; however, to achieve 100% control with bispyribac-sodium, MCPA + bentazone or MCPA + fluroxypyr, herbicides had to be applied by the 4-leaf stage. The results of this study could help in developing more sustainable and effective integrated weed management strategies for the control of triquetrous murdannia in rice fields in China. Nomenclature: Bispyribac-sodium; fluroxypyr; MCPA; MCPA + bentazone; MCPA + fluroxypyr; triquetrous murdannia, Murdannia triquetra (Wall.) Bruckn.; rice, Oryza sativa L.

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Background In comparison with terrestrial plants, those growing in wetlands have been rarely studied ethnobotanically, including in China, yet people living in or near wetlands can accumulate much knowledge of the uses of local wetland plants. A characteristic of wetlands, cutting across climatic zones, is that many species are widely distributed, providing opportunities for studying general patterns of knowledge of the uses of plants across extensive areas, in the present case China. There is urgency in undertaking such studies, given the rapid rates of loss of traditional knowledge of wetland plants as is now occurring. Methods There have been very few studies specifically on the traditional knowledge of wetland plants in China. However, much information on such knowledge does exist, but dispersed through a wide body of literature that is not specifically ethnobotanical, such as regional Floras. We have undertaken an extensive study of such literature to determine which species of wetland plants have been used traditionally and the main factors influencing patterns shown by such knowledge. Quantitative techniques have been used to evaluate the relative usefulness of different types of wetland plants and regression analyses to determine the extent to which different quantitative indices give similar results. Results 350 wetland plant species, belonging to 66 families and 187 genera, were found to have been used traditionally in China for a wide range of purposes. The top ten families used, in terms of numbers of species, were Poaceae, Polygonaceae, Cyperaceae, Lamiaceae, Asteraceae, Ranunculaceae, Hydrocharitaceae, Potamogetonaceae, Fabaceae, and Brassicaceae, in total accounting for 58.6% of all species used. These families often dominate wetland vegetation in China. The three most widely used genera were Polygonum, Potamogeton and Cyperus. The main uses of wetlands plants, in terms of numbers of species, were for medicine, food, and forage. Three different ways of assigning an importance value to species (Relative Frequency of Citation RFC; Cultural Importance CI; Cultural Value Index CV) all gave similar results. Conclusions A diverse range of wetland plants, in terms of both taxonomic affiliation and type of use, have been used traditionally in China. Medicine, forage and food are the three most important categories of use, the plants providing basic resources used by local people in their everyday lives. Local availability is the main factor influencing which species are used. Quantitative indexes, especially Cultural Value Index, proved very useful for evaluating the usefulness of plants as recorded in the literature.

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