Grazing regulates nutrient cycling in grasslands primarily through livestock behaviors of intaking, trampling, and excrement. However, how litter and dung decomposition are associated with these behaviors under different grazing management remain unexplored. We performed a two-year field experiment examining the effects of two grazing systems (continuous grazing, CG; rotational grazing, RG) and two intensities (8 and 16 sheep ha -1 ) on livestock behaviors and litter/dung decomposition in an alpine meadow on the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau. RG of 8 sheep ha -1 increased daily dry matter intake, live weight, dung mass, and urine mass, but decreased walking steps compared to CG. Average wind speed, initial dung phosphorus, walking steps, and initial litter nitrogen explained the most variance in litter dry matter (DM) decomposition. For dung DM decomposition, average relative humidity, initial dung nitrogen, and initial litter nitrogen were the top factor. Livestock behavior explained the largest proportion of variance in litter (42.5–60.5%) and dung (46.1–54.2%) decomposition, exceeding that of climate, plant traits, and soil properties. Grazing intensity negatively impacted litter decomposition but positively impacted dung decomposition, while climate and grazing system negatively affected both. These findings demonstrate that RG at moderate grazing intensity optimizes the distribution of livestock behaviors, which are associated with enhanced litter and dung decomposition and nutrient cycling in alpine meadow ecosystems.
Zhao et al. (Fri,) studied this question.