Statistical analysis
We examined the differences in V max between the leaf litter of tree species using pairwise Welch’s t -test (Welch 1947) using the variance of these coefficients estimated with thenls function. In this test, alpha level for significance (p < 0.05) was adjusted using the Bonferroni correction. We examined the effects of leaf litter elemental contents and ratios on V max (or Max-VE ) and TRA using least-squared linear regression analyses.