Plant community inventory
In 2016–2017, two of the four permanent transects (1: plots 1–28 in June 2016 and 4: plots 61–76 in June 2017) were revisited, and the plant community was inventoried using the 5-degree Hult-Sernander-Du Rietz logarithmic scale (5, 50–100% cover; 4, 25–50%; 3, 12.5–25%; 2, 6.25–12.5%; 1, <6.25%). The transects spans the length of the meadow from the river in the west to the edge of the reserve in the east. Although sampling plots are not marked in the terrain, the starting point of the transect, its direction, and distance between plots is very well documented in the original publication (Sandberg, 1948). Members in our team were involved in subsequent inventories of the meadow performed in the 1980s (Zhang, 1983), ensuring that the locations of the sampling plots are within a few meters of the original plots.