Abstract: When seeds fallen from the mother trees, their initial contact physical environment was litter or soil. The dispersal positions of seeds (seeds positioned on top of the litter, the soil surface and beneath the litter) determine the process of their natural regeneration. We simulated three different dispersal positions of Castanopsis kawakamii, including seeds positioned on top of the litter (2 and 4 cm litter was placed below the seed layer), soil surface (without litter), and seeds beneath the litter (2, 4, 6 and 8 cm litter covers in the upper layer of seeds). We examined the effects of seed dispersal position on the chlorophyll fluorescence characteristics, non-structural carbohydrate, specific leaf area, leaf dry matter content and nutrient content of seedlings. The results showed that leaf nitrogen content per area of seedlings had significantly positive correlation with soluble sugar content, non-structural carbohydrate content, and negative correlation with specific leaf area across different dispersal positions. Seedlings of the moderate litter cover (2 and 4 cm) adopted resource acquisitive strategies by increasing relative chlorophyll content, soluble sugar content, non-structural carbohydrate content, leaf dry matter content, leaf nitrogen content and phosphorus contents per area, and decreasing specific leaf area to achieve their demands for rapid growth. Seedlings grew on soil surface and beneath the deep litter (6 and 8 cm) adopted the resource conservative strategies with higher leaf nitrogen content per mass and specific leaf area, lower leaf dry matter content, and non-structural carbohydrate content to intercept more effective light resources to compensate for the shady environment brought by deep litter. This would further decrease the probability of seedling mortality due to ‘carbon starvation'. Seedlings under litter layer stored starch in leaf, and reduced the energy consumption of photosynthetic tissues (low PSⅡ maximum photochemical efficiency) to maintain seedling growth. Comprehensive analysis of entropy method indicated that low amount of litter cover (2 cm) significantly promoted seedling growth of C. kawakamii. In the future, we could regulate the thickness of litter layer to promote the growth and regeneration of C. kawakamii seedlings in natural forest.

Key words: seed disperse, Castanopsis kawakamii, chlorophyll fluorescence parameter, non-structural carbohydrate