Nitrogen addition weakens home-field advantage of litter decomposition by altering soil pH and bacterial communities in a subtropical forest

Abstract The home-field advantage (HFA) hypothesis predicts that litter decomposes faster in its home environment than elsewhere. Given the critical role of HFA effect in mediating terrestrial carbon and nutrient cycling, it remains unclear how nitrogen (N) deposition affects this effect. Here, we conducted a 12-month field experiment involving reciprocal litter translocation, with four N addition levels (0, 30, 50 and 100 kg N ha–1 year–1), in Quercus acutissima and Pinus massoniana stands in a subtropical urban forest and a mini meta-analysis of the effect of N addition on HFA in global forests. Results showed that a significant positive HFA of 3.98 was observed, but N addition (particularly with high rates) tended to weaken it, by decreasing it to –6.12 at 100 kg N ha–1 year–1. Conversely, the combined HFA index increased with bacterial community dissimilarity between stands. Such relationships were due to that N addition changed soil bacterial diversity and composition in P. massoniana stand and led to the convergence of bacterial communities between stands, mainly by lowering soil pH. Similarly, our experiment and meta-analysis showed that the species-level HFA index and its response to N addition also decreased with N addition rate (P < 0.05), suggesting the generalization of how N addition affects HFA. Our findings suggest that soil acidification driven by N inputs indirectly reduces HFA through altering bacterial communities, which helps to better understand and predict the dynamics of HFA effect and the cycling of carbon and nitrogen in forest ecosystems under N deposition.