The subject of the paper is the analysis of the relationship between spontaneous vegetation diversity and soil respiration in novel post-coal mine ecosystem. In the natural and semi-natural ecosystems, soil respiration process (Rs) is a crucial ecosystem function regulating terrestrial ecosystems’ carbon cycle. Soil respiration depends on the quality and quantity of the soil organic matter (SOM), the soil microbes’ activity, and root metabolism. The listed factors are directly related to the composition diversity of vegetation plant species (biochemistry). For many years, soil respiration parameters have been studied in natural and seminatural vegetation communities and ecosystems. However, there still need to be a greater understanding of the relationship between vegetation plant species diversity and soil respiration as a crucial ecosystem function. Plant species diversity has to be analysed through both the taxonomic diversity and the functional diversity. These approaches reflect the composition, structure, and function of plant species communities. We hypothesise that the diversity of the spontaneous vegetation species composition shapes the amount of soil respiration in a post-coal mine novel ecosystem. The soil respiration differs significantly along the vegetational types driven by habitat gradients and is significantly higher in highly functional richness and dispersion vegetation patches. Contrary to our expectation, soil respiration was the highest in the less diverse vegetation types - both taxonomical and functional evenness were non-significant factors. Only functional dispersion is weakly negative correlated with soil respiration level (SRL).
Any newly created area includes human-created habitats such as the mineral material of post-coal mining spoil heaps undergoing natural colonization and ecosystem development during the succession processes of vegetation colonization. The study of the factors that influence the succession dynamics, and the mechanisms behind this, have a long history (including the species-area relationship or Arrhenius equation). Nevertheless, the list of scientific questions is increasing. One of the significant issues in the study of these processes is the relationship between factors influencing the Biodiversity–Ecosystem Functioning (BEF) relationships. The main prerequisite is the relationships between the plant species' assemblage mechanisms including diversity and the variety of assembly rules concerning the environmental abiotic habitat processes and these properties are not straightforward. At the large scale, parameters such as age and area of the colonized sites are considered to be important. These relationships are more complicated in newly established post-mineral excavation habitats where novel ecosystems are developing. Regardless of the degree of disturbances, vegetation re-establishes in such environments, as a result of spontaneous succession, by the colonization and establishment of the best-adapted organisms. In the habitats of post-coal mining spoil heaps with pure oligotrophic mineral conditions, the non-analogous, newly formed composition of flora, fauna, and saprophytes has been stated in many previous field studies. This study aimed to explore the biodiversity versus area size relationships, in particular, it investigated the species composition and diversity found in the development of the spontaneous vegetation formed during primary succession on mineral substrate habitats of postcoal mining spoil heaps of different area sizes. We tested the hypothesis: species diversity of the vegetation patches on coal mine spoil heaps becomes more diverse on larger sites over time. These results indicate that the area size of the spoil heap significantly affects the diversity of the vegetation. Regardless of which of the characteristics of the vegetation type (dominant species) is compared, the vegetation on the heaps differs depending on its area size.
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