Soil sampling for abiotic parameters and soil microbial analysis
Nine soil cores were taken from each experimental subplot (1.3 cm diameter, 10 cm depth). these cores were then bulked and homogenized. A 2 mL tube was filled with a subset of homogenized soil for molecular analysis at the day of sampling and stored at -80 °C. Soils were sampled twice, both at roughly the same time that the plant community composition was recorded; once at the end of the conditioning phase, just before the vegetation was removed (May 2017) in order to establish the conditioning effects on the soil microbial community. The second sampling was used to assess whether the legacy effects persisted over time and took place roughly two months after the establishment of the responding plant community (September 2018).