Abstract:In order to study the community features, soil nutrient characteristics and their correlations in different degraded grasslands of East Qilian Mountains, the lightly degraded grassland (LDG), moderately degraded grassland (MDG) and heavily degraded grassland (SDG) were taken as the research objects, and the combination of field investigation, laboratory measurement and data statistical analysis was adopted. The results showed that:(1) The characteristics of plant communities, including aboveground biomass, height, density, frequency and vegetation coverage, showed a decreasing trend from LDG to SDG, and the difference was significant (P < 0.05). And the species Margalef index, Shannon index and Evenness index of the MDG were the maximum, however, the Dominance index was the minimum. (2) There were 19 families, 38 genera and 41 species in the study area, and the plants with strong ecological adaptability mainly concentrated in Legumes, Gramineae, Compositae and Rosaceae. The vegetation types of different degraded grasslands included K. humilis with Leymus secalinus, K. humilis with Thalictrum alpinum, K. humilis with L. secalinus, among which K. humilis was the dominant species in different degraded grasslands. In different degraded grasslands, the functional groups were dominated by forbs, followed by Gramineae grasses and poison grasses. (3) With the aggravation of grassland degradation, soil available nitrogen, available phosphorus, organic carbon and water content all decreased, while pH increased. (4) The highest contribution rate of soil factors to vegetation growth in different degraded grasslands was the available nitrogen, available phosphorus and water content, respectively. In summary, with the aggravation of grassland degradation, the community structure of plants was changing to a single trend, soil nutrient content was reduced and the contribution rate of soil factors to plants was also changed accordingly.